


jj + kie oneshots

by someoneyouloved



Category: Outer Banks (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Smut, jj + kie oneshots, literally anything y’all want pick your poison, requests are open!!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-25
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:53:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 22,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24504949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/someoneyouloved/pseuds/someoneyouloved
Summary: jiara oneshots from tumblr/ao3 requests!! please feel free to send me a prompt anytime :)find me on tumblr @hmsjiara or leave requests in the comments!
Relationships: JJ & Kiara (Outer Banks), JJ/Kiara (Outer Banks)
Comments: 108
Kudos: 351





	1. always a heart attack away from falling in love

**Author's Note:**

> request by @shaymq7: Hi! I didn’t see an ask box so I hope this okay to submit a promt! I loved your other jiara fic, you nail there characters! I was wondering if you could write something about them revealing their feelings, John B and Sarah are alive but while they were “dead” JJ and Kie got really close and now everyone is back and everyone sees the change in their bond and they get into an argument and end up revealing their feelings? 
> 
> ahhh this was so fun to write!! as always, i can’t write anything short lol. i hope this is what you wanted, i was going to include all of the pogues perspectives but then i just really liked writing for sarah. thank you so much for the prompt!!
> 
> summary: jj and kiara are in love and oblivious, john b and pope are 100% done with their shit, and sarah cameron (for better or worse) decides to play match maker. warning: brief/minor mention of abuse.

A month ago, Sarah would have given anything to be where she was now: sitting around the fire at the Chateau with the Pogues, John B’s arms wrapped around her as they laughed and listened to JJ tell ghost stories.

And she was thrilled to be back— the three month long chase for the gold in the Bahamas had been exhausting, and she and John B had missed the Pogues so much that it hurt. But they’d done it— they’d found the gold, and returned to the Outer Banks a whole lot richer than when they’d left it. She’d testified to the cops, they all had, and now her dad and brother were being tried on all sorts of charges.

And it was hard, but she was getting through it. With John B’s help, and the Pogues. There was just one problem. 

JJ and Kiara.

Well, maybe _problem_ was the incorrect word to use. There was nothing _wrong_ with them, but ever since her and John B had returned and reunited with the group, Sarah had noticed that they were acting... different. 

She hadn’t even been friends with the Pogues for that long, so maybe the few whirlwind days of cop chases and treasure hunts weren’t enough to go off of, but Sarah couldn’t just ignore it.

JJ and Kiara were close, she knew that. Kie was close with _all_ of the Pogues, they were her best friends. And Sarah knew that they’d all had a thing for her at some point, that John B had kissed Kiara during their hunt for the gold, but Kie had always insisted that she would never, _ever_ reciprocate their feelings. 

Personally, Sarah thought her best friend was full of shit. She’d known them for years— how could she not have feelings for at least _one_ of them? 

But she knew that conversation wouldn’t go over well with Kiara— and they were still getting used to being friends again, she didn’t want to rock the boat.

Still, she couldn’t prevent herself from noticing things. 

Like how these days, JJ and Kiara were always touching, as if physical contact wasn’t just a want, but a need. It was little things— sitting a little too close on the couch to be normal, knees and shoulders brushing, JJ’s head on Kiara’s shoulder and her running her fingers through his hair. JJ helping Kiara into the boat even though she didn’t need it, grinding on each other at the Boneyard, finding them cuddling on the pullout after falling asleep there the night before.

And it wasn’t like they were trying to hide it. Even now, Kiara was leaning against JJ’s legs, her head on his knee and his fingers braiding her hair as she laughed at whatever Pope was saying. 

It was painfully obvious, so how the hell was Sarah supposed to stay quiet?

She cracked when she found them lying in the hammock one day, fingers brushing as they passed a joint between them, an entangled mess of limbs that made it difficult to tell where JJ ended and Kiara began. 

She asked Kiara if they could talk, watched as she murmured something in JJ’s ear that Sarah couldn’t hear. He grumbled, wrapping his arms around her waist when she tried to leave, and Kiara was smiling as she forced herself from his grip. 

Sarah raised her eyebrows at her as they headed inside the Chateau, but she made sure they were far enough away before she said, “Okay, enough is enough. You. JJ. Spill. And don’t even bother denying it.”

She thought Kiara _would_ deny it, scoff and roll her eyes and say Sarah was being delusional, or too romantic, or any one of her usual deflections. But instead, she froze, her shoulders sagging as if she’d run out of air.

The change in her mood was dramatic enough that Sarah faltered, suddenly regretting bringing it up all together.

“Kie, I’m sorry, I—“

“It doesn’t matter,” Kiara snapped, cutting her off, but she wouldn’t meet Sarah’s gaze. “It’s nothing, I’m not—“

“Kie, please don’t do that,” Sarah sighed, moving towards her, but Kiara took a step back. “Don’t pretend like it’s nothing, we both know that’s a lie. If you would just—“

“What, Sarah? What should I do?” She asked, and Sarah flinched at her sharp tone. Her gaze flicked towards the screen door, and Kiara must have been thinking the same thing she was, because her voice was quieter as she continued. “I’m not going to tell him, I can’t. Don’t bother trying to convince me.”

“But JJ loves you, it wouldn’t be a big deal,” Sarah told her, remembering all the times she’d caught JJ staring at Kiara when she wasn’t looking, the smile on his face when she was telling them a story about sea turtles or rode a wave better than he did, the heat and lust in his eyes whenever she danced with him. “Just tell him the truth.”

“It _would_ be a big deal,” Kiara insisted, hands on her hips and fire in her eyes. “We’ve been best friends for years, Sarah, okay? Do you know how many times I’ve shot him down? It wouldn’t be fair to bring this up now, not when everything’s finally back to normal.”

“Oh, bullshit,” Sarah said, shaking her head. “You’re just scared, Kie. That’s normal.”

“Of _course_ I’m scared,” Kiara hissed, her eyes suddenly filling with tears. Sarah’s heart twinged— fuck, this was worse than she’d thought. Because Kiara didn’t just _like_ JJ. No, this wasn’t some schoolgirl crush, this was the real deal. The _I’m in love with you_ kind of deal. “And don’t you think that I _want_ to tell him? But you don’t get it, Sarah. After you and John B...”

She paused, her gaze darkening like any of the Pogues did when they mentioned Sarah and John B’s disappearance, her bottom lip trembling. 

Sarah felt a familiar rush of guilt. They’d tried to think of a way to contact the Pogues for weeks, wanting to keep them safe and protect themselves as well, and they’d eventually decided to send a postcard with a coded message and a burner phone. 

Kiara had cried for the entire call, and JJ and Pope hadn’t stopped talking, but none of them had mentioned what it had been like without them. Sarah had avoided asking, not wanting to push, but...

“Kie, what was it like when we were gone?” She asked, careful not to use the word _dead_. John B had made that mistake once, joking about it, and JJ had left the Chateau and slammed the door behind him without a word. Kiara had apologized to John B on his behalf, followed him out. They’d found them at Rixon’s Cove later, JJ’s hair wet from surfing and Kiara wearing his sweatshirt. 

“Sarah, I don’t—“

“You can be honest with me. Please. I want to know—“

“Fine, it was awful!” Kiara screamed, and Sarah didn’t think there was anyway JJ hadn’t heard them by now. So much for being discreet. “We were all mess, we thought you’d _died_ , for God’s sake. Pope was barely around, JJ was getting drunk by noon, beating up Kooks every chance he got. And I...”

She faltered, as if debating whether or not to continue. Kiara had always been like this, she’d noticed. She would be more than happy to help other people with their problems, but when it came to her own? Not so much.

Kiara shook her head, as if forcing herself to pull it together. “I was a mess, too. I could barely sleep, I kept having nightmares. And JJ was the _only_ person who was there for me. We barely spent a minute apart afterward, you know? He’d sit with me for hours at the Wreck, and I stayed at the Chateau every night. You want to know why? Because I was so scared that he would go back to his dad, and that I’d lose him like I lost the two of you. And I can’t— I can’t lose him, Sarah, I—“

She was hyperventilating now, and Sarah wrapped her arms around her as Kiara buried her face in her shoulder, her tears wet against Sarah’s bare skin. She didn’t know what to do except murmur soft words of comfort, and curse herself for bringing it up in the first place. Kiara was right, she _didn’t_ know, and she should have asked before now. 

“Hey, is everything okay—“

Of course, JJ chose that moment to enter the house.

Sarah was facing the door, so she got to watch his facial expression change as he realized that Kiara was crying, saw JJ falter, his smile fading. 

He was rushing forward in an instant, his gaze concerned but determined, obviously ready to comfort Kie if she needed it, but Kiara was already out of Sarah’s arms, brushing the tears from her cheeks and moving towards the door.

“I think I’m gonna call it a night, guys. See you tomorrow.”

Sarah didn’t mention that it was only eight, or that the Pogues had been planning to go night fishing. She stayed quiet, watching JJ. 

“Kie, wait,” he said, catching her by the arm as she walked past him, pulling her close and talking so quietly that Sarah had to strain her ears to hear what he was saying. “Are you okay? What’s wrong?”

“I’m fine, JJ,” she snapped, and Sarah saw Kiara flinch at the harshness of her own voice. God, she was so freaking whipped it was hilarious. “I’m just tired, I want to go home.”

“Fine,” he said, his eyes narrowing even as his shoulders sagged and he raised his hands in surrender. “I’ll come with you, let me just—“

“No,” Kiara said, her tone cold and leaving no room for argument. Sarah wondered if JJ saw through it— probably not, boys were oblivious. “I want to be alone. Don’t follow me.”

With that, she turned and walked out the door.

It was silent as they listened to her car engine start, then the sharp sound of tires against gravel.

JJ’s muttered _fuck_ was quiet as he ripped his hat from his head and ran his fingers through his hair. He didn’t look at Sarah, grabbing two beers from the fridge and collapsing onto the couch. He turned on the tv, offered her the second beer after tearing the cap off with his teeth, and Sarah took it as a invitation, sitting down beside him.

It took her a few minutes to gather up the courage to say something. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No,” he said, and while he didn’t sound angry with her, she knew there was no point in pushing it. She hadn’t known JJ for long, but she had already picked up on his dislike for being backed into a corner, literally and metaphorically. Kiara was the only person who could get away with it, or John B, but ever since they’d returned from the Bahamas it was no question who JJ was leaning towards more.

Screw staying out of it— Sarah was done watching her friends be miserable over each other. 

She was going to do something about it.

•••

Their plan for finding the gold had flaws, that was undeniable. But, she had learned that the first aspect of any mission, no matter subject or scale, was reconnaissance. 

So, Sarah did her research. First step: observation. 

She didn’t push the matter with Kiara or JJ, and after a few awkward, clipped reactions, things were back to normal between them. Which was good; she already had enough work to do.

Sarah had been watching them before, but now she was paying attention. She noticed how JJ gravitated towards Kiara in any situation, the warmth and _love_ that appeared on his face whenever she ranted about climate change, how when Kiara was dancing with a Kook at a Boneyard party he didn’t take his eyes off of them for the entire night, ignored the girls who were trying to talk to him.   
  
JJ was obvious, but Kiara was a little more subtle. She laughed at his jokes, but JJ was funny, so that wasn’t that incriminating. She got pissed when JJ rode his bike without a helmet, but that was undeniably irresponsible, so it didn’t say much on its own. But Sarah learned that you had to read between the lines, which was new, because Kiara was typically an open book.

Rafe corners her at a party one night, out on bail, somehow having slipped his police detail. Kiara holds her own, slaps him across the face when he calls her a slut. But JJ is JJ, of course, so when Rafe shoves Kiara in retaliation, he makes good on his prior threat and punches him in the throat. Honestly, Sarah doesn’t know how he managed to move that fast— it was like he appeared out of thin air the moment Kiara screamed.

It was after, though, when she saw it— when John B and Pope had fallen asleep and she got out of bed to get a glass of water and found them sitting next to each other on the porch. They were speaking too quietly for her to hear, but Kiara was bandaging JJ’s bruised hand with the kind of care Sarah had only seen her use on baby sea turtles before. She was wearing a crop top, and JJ’s gaze kept flicking to the bruises on her stomach from when Rafe had shoved her into the bar cart.

His hand hovered over the marks, and then Kiara nodded at him, as if giving him permission, and his fingers were brushing over them with a level of tenderness that Sarah knew JJ only showed a handful of people. 

After that, it felt like she was intruding, but Sarah had her evidence. Time for step two. 

•••

The first person she questioned was John B, but he was no help.

She asked him if he’d noticed how different things were between JJ and Kie, and he just shrugged, said he’d noticed but that it was best to let them work it out on their own. 

Pope, to her surprise, took less convincing.

“Wait, you and Kiara _kissed_?”

Apparently, Kiara had left more than a few key details out when she’d filled Sarah in on what happened while she was gone. 

“Yep,” Pope said, nodding as he rung something up at the cash register. Sarah had caught him between shifts, insisted that she had something important to ask him. “After we sent John B off in the Phantom. I’d told her I loved her, but... well, it obviously didn’t work out, so.”

He didn’t sound bitter, so she decided it was okay to continue. “So... that’s why her and JJ aren’t together? Because she doesn’t want to hurt your feelings?”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “Kie and I talked it out— we’re good. We just want different things, you know?”

He seemed unreasonably cool with it, and Sarah recalled Kiara telling her about a girl he’d met at his internship at the hospital. She was happy for him, Pope deserved it.

“Okay, great,” Sarah said, grinning at him. “So, JJ and Kie. I was thinking—“

“Oh, no,” Pope said, interrupting her. “I’m not getting involved with that. They can figure out their own shit, they don’t need our help.”

“So you _have_ noticed,” she said, ignoring the second part of what he’d said.

“Of course,” Pope scoffed, rolling his eyes. “They’re not exactly subtle. But this is JJ we’re talking about— he’s been flirting with Kiara since the sixth grade, and she just kept rejecting him. He’s not gonna believe that she likes him until _she_ tells him. Besides, Sarah, do you really want to get between those two idiots?”

Sarah sighed, shaking her head. “I can’t just do nothing. They’re gonna explode eventually, I can tell.”

“Exactly,” Pope said, giving her a _look_. “And you don’t want to be around them when it does.”

•••

The explosion happens sooner than Sarah thought it would.

John B and Pope are standing in the driveway when she arrives at the Chateau, like dogs who have been sent out to the yard. There’s screaming coming from inside the house— it’s mostly Kiara, but she can hear JJ’s voice too.

“What’s going on?” Sarah demanded as she shut her car door and approached the boys, worried that all her hard work was going to be ruined. 

“It’s John B’s fault,” Pope informed her, cringing as Kiara’s voice started to rise in volume again. “He let it slip that JJ went back home, and then Kiara saw the bruises on his neck, and well...”

He trailed off, gesturing towards the Chateau with a helpless expression.

“So you’re just letting them go at it?” She asked, scowling at them. John B flinched a little, like he always did when she got mad. “They’ll kill each other!”

Pope shrugged. “Arguing can be a turn-on for some people. Maybe they’ll fuck instead and put us all out of our misery.”

“Pope, _no_ ,” Sarah hissed, though she did think he might have a point. “I have a plan— they’re _ruining_ it.”

At that moment, the porch door slammed against it’s hinges, and JJ appeared, fists clenched at his sides and his face lined with a bitter combination of anger and guilt.

The source of his anxiety was right behind him. Kiara was in rare form: eyes flashing, hands on her hips, screaming at JJ to _come back here._

If it had been anyone other than JJ, Sarah was sure they would have caved by now. Kiara was scary when she was angry.

“JJ, I’m _talking_ to you!” Kiara screamed, kicking up dust as she stormed towards him. “Listen to me, for God’s sake!”

But JJ didn’t turn around, palming the keys to his bike and mounting it. Sarah saw him glance at the helmet on the back, as if contemplating whether wearing it would lessen Kiara’s fury. He didn’t pick it up.

“JJ, I swear to God if you—“

JJ revved the engine, drowning out the sound of Kiara’s voice. Sarah could see the tears in her eyes, how badly she was trembling. She was angry, but there was fear there too, and that’s when she saw the bruises on JJ’s neck, his split lip. _Shit_.

Kiara tried to say something else, but JJ cut her off. “What do you want me to do, Kiara? It’s my house, he’s my _dad_. I can’t just leave!”

“Yes, you can,” Kiara insisted, her anger fading, as if she was trying to get JJ to listen to her. “You can stay with John B, or Pope, or _me_. I’ll talk to my parents—“

“Your parents don’t want me within five feet of you,” JJ reminded her, something dark and bitter entering his gaze at the thought. “I’m not putting this on you, Kie. End of discussion.”

He put his foot on the gas pedal, but Kiara was standing in front of the bike, hands on her hips and a determined expression on her face. 

“Kie, get out of the way,” he said, glaring at her, but Sarah still saw that his hands were shaking. “I’m done talking about this.”

“Well I’m not,” she snapped. “I’m sick of this, JJ! I’m sick of _worrying_ about you, I can’t—“

“Why do you even _care_ , Kie?” JJ shouted, and Sarah winced. Oh, he really had _no_ idea, did he?

She didn’t expect Kiara to tell him the truth, but then—

“Because _I’m in love with you!”_ She screamed, her eyes brimming with tears as the words passed her lips. 

Sarah held in a squeal as JJ froze, his foot leaving the gas pedal as he raised his head to look at Kiara. 

“What?” He asked, as if he hadn’t understood her, his mouth opening and closing like a fish gasping for air. 

Sarah thought Kiara would stay quiet, or take it back, but her voice was firm and unwavering when she said, “I’m in love with you, JJ. And I can’t keep watching you do this to yourself, I can’t lose—“

But then Kiara stopped talking, because JJ’s lips were pressed against hers, and she seemed to have more important things to do as he wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer. She threaded her fingers through his hair, tugging at it, and John B wolf-whistled while Pope yelled at them to get a room.

Sarah just grinned. Pope had been right, she realized. JJ and Kiara hadn’t needed her help, it had just taken a screaming match for them to finally get their heads out of their asses. Go figure.

She’d thought it would be weird, _different_ , seeing JJ and Kie like this. But it was the exact opposite— the look in JJ’s eyes when he stared at her was the same, and Kiara was shoving him in the shoulder and burying her face in the crook of his neck after he said something predictably idiotic. It wasn’t different, it was just _them_ , JJ and Kie.

As they made their way over to Sarah and the boys, Kiara slid her hands into JJ’s, and she smiled at the identical grins on their faces.

Mission accomplished. 


	2. ‘cause you’re amazing (just the way you are)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> kiara had an eating disorder during her kook year. when it resurfaces, jj and the other pogues notice something’s wrong and want to help. but will she let them?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> request by @love-life-always on tumblr. 
> 
> this turned into one big angsty mess real quick lol. but protective!jj is my kink, so... here you go lmao. thank you so much for the request, i hope you like it :)
> 
> disclaimer: i understand that eating disorders are a serious/complex issue and am NOT trying to romanticize them in any way. and while i did some research before writing this, i am in no way an expert nor have i ever experienced something like this. so, if any part of this is inaccurate or ignorant i apologize. if this triggers you in anyway, please do what’s best for your mental/emotional health.
> 
> trigger warnings: eating disorders, panic attacks, brief mentions of abuse.

It was an unspoken rule among the Pogues that they didn’t talk about Kiara’s Kook Year.

It hadn’t always been that way. When Kiara had returned to the Chateau with a years worth of apologies and a case of Miller Lite, John B and Pope had forgiven her almost instantly, but not JJ. Weeks of veiled insults and sharp glares had followed, and despite John B and Pope’s efforts to sway him, JJ seemed determined to hate her forever.

But eventually, even he managed to forgive her for abandoning them. Kiara assumed that it was a combination of her constant presence, and the boobs and curves she’d developed during her Kook Year. She couldn’t really blame them for noticing, since they were horny teenage boys and she spent the majority of her time in a bikini.

So, things went back to normal, and the Pogues caught on to the fact that Kiara didn’t want to discuss her absence, or her exile from the Kook Academy. It was easier this way, she told herself. Talking about Sarah still hurt too much, and as for everything else... well, it wasn’t important.

So, she doesn’t talk about Sarah, about how they got drunk and watched movies and saved baby sea turtles together, how her heart aches when she thinks about her. She doesn’t talk about the girls at the Kook Academy who spread rumors behind her back, who shove her in the hallways and on one occasion dump a smoothie on her head in the cafeteria. She deletes the mean comments under her Instagram posts before the Pogues can see, because she doesn’t need them to defend her, and the last thing she wants is to explain why everyone hates her so much.

Because she just got her friends back, and Kiara isn’t going to burden them with her problems, not when they have it so much worse.

•••

The words _eating disorder_ cause a certain kind of alarm to go off in Kiara’s brain.

Because yes, there’d been those months at the Kook Academy where she’d gone from diet to diet, weighed herself after every meal, looked at the girls in her grade with their flat stomachs and thin, long legs and hated her curves and muscle-toned limbs. She’d followed all the trends— juice cleanses and swearing off anything over a hundred calories. She even stopped surfing, switched to running, wondering if it would make a difference.

Her mother’s comments hadn’t helped. Once Kiara was going to parties and sleepovers with Sarah, her mom started buying her clothes that were two sizes too small, handing her grapefruit halves in the morning when Kiara asked for eggs and bacon, shot pointed glares at the half-eaten box of cookies on her dresser.

So, she started just... not eating. It was almost too easy to do. All she had to do was say that she was running late for school and skipping breakfast, snack on celery sticks for lunch, tell her parents she had homework to avoid coming to dinner. And it had worked: she’d gotten thinner, and her mother smiled when she started wearing the clothes she’d bought her, so Kiara assumed it was fine.

It was a visit to her doctor that made Kiara realize that what she was doing to herself was wrong. There’d been no official diagnosis, just a few pointed questions about her daily food intake, a suggestion to incorporate more protein into her diet. But Kiara had read between the lines, and she’d gotten over it, moved on, recognized that what she was doing wasn’t how she wanted to live her life. And she hadn’t told anyone, especially not the Pogues, because it was her business and they didn’t need to know.

The problem is that sometimes Kiara forgets to catch herself.

Like when she spends a little too long looking at her stomach in the mirror, or when JJ offers her the rest of his fries at the Wreck and she wrinkles her nose and says _too many carbs._

He frowns, presses a hand to her forehead, as if checking for a temperature. “Too many carbs? Who are you, and what have you done with Kiara Carrera?”

She laughs, shoves him away from her, goes to get another beer from the fridge, but JJ is still watching her when she gets back. “I didn’t know you cared about that sort of stuff.”

“What do you mean?” She asks, avoiding his gaze as she knocked John B’s feet off of the counter.

“Calories and shit,” he said with a shrug, and it was a perfectly reasonable remark, but Kiara didn’t like the direction their conversation was going in. “Is this something you picked up from the Kooks? You turning into one of those soccer moms who meal plan and don’t let her kids eat sugar?”

It hits a little too close to home, so Kiara snatches a fry from his basket and makes sure that he sees her eat it.

“There,” she said, chewing somewhat obnoxiously. “Happy now?”

JJ rolled his eyes, turned to listen to whatever Pope was saying about his internship, but Kiara couldn’t help but feel like she’d dodged a bullet.

JJ couldn’t find out. Not now, not ever.

•••

Being forced to attend Midsummers is the last thing Kiara needs or wants, but her mother doesn’t care.

She thinks it’s how she copes. Kiara can hang with whoever she likes, as long as her mother can put her in a pretty dress and show her off to the Kooks.

The subtle, pointed comments start again.

_Take it in a bit on the hem, Silvia. I’m not used to this, you know. I never had Kiara’s curves when I was younger._

_I know that your friends don’t have to worry about this, Kiara, but you have a figure to maintain. Eating at the Wreck every night just isn’t going to fly._

_Maybe a side salad instead, sweetheart. I’m paying the seamstress by the hour._

Kiara’s not proud of it, but she does go along with her mother, because she’s tired of fighting with her, and the idea of her daughter going to Midsummers with all the Sarah Cameron’s of the world has made her happier than Kiara has ever seen her.

She tells herself it’s only for a couple of weeks, that she can get through it, but it’s getting harder to ignore the comments, to resist the urge to weigh herself after a bag of popcorn or a sandwich from the Wreck.

Before, when she was friends with Sarah, it was easier to hide. Sarah didn’t really notice other people— it wasn’t her fault, just how she’d been raised.

The Pogues are different.

At first, they buy all the usual excuses. She’s not hungry, she already ate. But then John B asks her to split a burger with him at the Wreck, or Pope roasts her a s’more and she refuses, and they start to notice.

One time, Kiara buys a new kind of green tea ice cream from the grocery store, and she eats it all in one sitting, calories be damned.

JJ laughs, nudges John B. “Now that’s what I’m talking about. Damn, Kie.”

It’s a joke, a passing comment, but Kiara flinches, feels a sudden surge of regret. _Shit_. Her mother was going to kill her.

JJ sees it, because of course he does, and then his teasing grin disappears and he gives Pope and John B a knowing look.

Pope looks instantly uncomfortable as John B clears his throat, and Kiara doesn’t like it one bit. She feels cornered, suddenly on edge, as John B opens his mouth and says, “Kie, is everything okay? With you, I mean?”

“Of course,” she says, shrugging, the deflection easy. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Well, it’s just—“

“You’re not _fucking_ eating.”

Kiara flinches for real this time at JJ’s harsh, blatant tone, her stomach hollowing out as John B hisses JJ’s name and says _this isn’t what we talked about._

Oh, so they’re _talking_ about her now. Wonderful.

“Fuck this,” she says, springing to her feet, the empty ice cream cartoon and metal spoon clattering to the floor. She feels sick just looking at it. “Y’all are— y’all are _delusional_ , okay? I’m out.”

“Kie, it’s okay,” Pope says, his eyes on the floor. “Millions of people have, uh, stuff like this, you know, it’s not—“

“I do _not_ have a eating disorder,” Kiara growls at him, ignoring Pope’s own flinch, how he curls in on himself at her words. “Your statistics don’t apply to me, okay, Pope? You have no idea what’s going on.”

“Kie, we’re just trying to help—“

“Fuck you, John B,” she says, turning to leave, not able to stand the pity on his face.

“ _No_ ,” JJ snarls, rising from his chair, clutching the neck of his beer bottle so hard she thinks it might shatter. “I’ve had enough. Do you know that’s the most I’ve seen you eat in weeks? Something’s wrong, Kie, we’re not idiots, okay? So just tell us—“

“I don’t have to tell you shit, Maybank,” she snaps, the pit in her stomach filling itself with something cold and bitter. “This is my business, just like whatever the fuck is happening with your dad is yours. So leave me _alone_.”

She regrets the words as soon as she says them, but it’s too late, because JJ’s beer bottle shatters and John B yells as alcohol and shards of glass scatter across the floor, and Kiara is out the door before any of them can make her stay.

They’re just worried, she knows that, but it’s fine. She has it handled.

•••

In reality, it’s the opposite of fine.

Kiara avoids the Pogues in the week leading up to Midsummers, ignores the texts they send her asking her to meet, actually _hides_ when John B comes to find her at the Wreck.

She tells herself she just has to get through Midsummers, and then it’ll all work itself out.

The stress makes it worse, she thinks, and in between her anxiety over the Pogues and her mother’s pre-Midsummers prep, Kiara doesn’t realize that she can’t remember the last time she ate until she’s pulling up to the club with her parents.

It’s kind of like a wake up call, the shakiness in her limbs and the empty feeling in her stomach, and the next thing she knows, she’s hyperventilating over the sink in the girls bathroom.

It’s hard to breathe, and the heavily perfumed air definitely isn’t helping, and her mother is going to kill her, and Kiara doesn’t even know how it got this bad again. She doesn’t look too thin in the mirror, at least not to her, but what do other people see?

She’s not quite sure how, but she manages to find her phone in her clutch, to fumble through typing in her password and locating Pope’s contact. 

He answers on the first ring.

“Kie? Is everything okay? Where are you?”

He’s obviously concerned, and she feels like such an idiot, because she spent the past week pushing him and everyone else away when all they wanted to do was help her.

“Bathroom,” she manages to say, fighting to speak past the tightness in her throat. “In— Inside. Pope, I can’t breathe, I can’t—“

“Okay, Kie, it’s okay,” he murmured, sounding surprisingly calm. “Fuck, I’m working, I can’t leave. But I’m gonna help you, okay? Just breathe. Give me one second—”

The call ended, and Kiara tried not to panic anymore than she already was, but it was a relief when Pope’s name appeared on her phone screen again.

“Pope?” She asks, his name more of a sob than anything.

“Yeah, it’s me. Listen, Kie, you’re gonna be fine. You’re not hurt, right?”

She shakes her head, then remembers that he can’t see her, and confirms that she’s fine (physically, at least) through the phone. Pope keeps doing that, asking her questions in a low, level voice, until she hears a knock on the bathroom door.

“Pope, is that you at the door?” She asks, clutching her phone tighter in her hand, any sense of control she’d managed to regain vanishing.

“No, it’s—“

“Kie? Kie, are you in there?“

She doesn’t know why, but the sound of JJ’s voice makes her crumble. She can still hear Pope talking to her through the phone, hear JJ on the other side of the door, but it’s like it’s all coming from very far away. Her breathing picks up again, and she barely registers JJ’s _fuck it, I’m coming in._

His knock on the stall door jerks her back into reality. “Kie? It’s JJ, can you open the door?”

With shaking hands, she grapples with the lock, automatically shrinking away when light floods the stall and she sees JJ staring down at her.

She must look like a mess— sitting on the floor of the bathroom in her dress, mascara running, like some girl who just got dumped by her boyfriend at a party. But she can’t really bring herself to care about that, because she still can’t seem to get enough air into her lungs.

“JJ,” she whimpers, because he’s just standing there like he doesn’t know what to do, some raw emotion in his eyes she can’t bring herself to decipher right now.

“Hey, hey it’s okay,” JJ says, snapping out of whatever trance he’d fallen into at the sight of her, his movements slow as he crouches down beside her, his hands raised in mock surrender. “Take it easy, okay, Kie? Just breathe.”

He takes the phone from her, has a brief conversation with Pope, then hangs up and pockets it. Kiara doesn’t object, staring at her hands and trying to stop herself from shaking.

“Can I?” JJ asks, and she realizes he’s asking to hold her hands.

She nods, and then his warm, calloused fingers are brushing against her skin as he rubs soothing circles into the back of her palms. Her heart rate isn’t slowing, though, her breaths coming quick and fast again, but then JJ’s arms are around her and he’s pulling her back against his chest and murmuring reassurances into the top of her head. 

He tells her to copy his breathing, and she does, focusing on the steady beat of his heart against her shoulder, the fact that his hands are still holding hers.

Eventually, her breathing returns to normal, and her anxiety is replaced by exhaustion. She sags against JJ, closes her eyes, relaxes into his warmth.

The next thing she remembers is JJ guiding her into the passenger seat of the van and buckling her seatbelt. It’s easy to trust him, to let her eyes slip closed and listen to the steady, familiar hum of the engine.

Kiara doesn’t ask where they’re going, and she must fall asleep at some point, because then she’s waking up in the driveway at the Chateau. She ignores JJ’s offered hand and stumbles out of the van, tugging off her heels the moment she gets inside and collapsing onto the pullout couch.

She doesn’t want to move ever again, content to fall asleep right there, exhaustion heavy in her bones, but JJ takes one look at her and pulls her to her feet. He takes her to the bathroom, turns the shower on and places a hand on her back to guide her inside. He asks if she wants him to stay. She says no, because JJ’s already looking at her like she’s a wounded animal, and she doesn’t want him to think that she can’t do anything by herself.

Even if she almost has another panic attack once he leaves, has to remind herself to breathe as she undresses and steps into the shower. The hot water helps, and she loses track of time standing in the spray. She never hears the door open, but when she gets out there’s a pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt on the counter.

She puts them on, drys her hair with a towel but leaves it down, too exhausted to do anything else. The sweatshirt smells like JJ, and she breathes it in. She doesn’t want to think about what it means. She can have a pass tonight, she figures.

When she opens the door, the hallway smells like cooking oil and burnt toast. She wrinkles her nose, pads into the living room on silent feet, and she thinks JJ might be right to treat her like a skittish animal, because when she walks into the kitchen and sees the plate of eggs and toast on the table, she wants to run back inside the bathroom.

JJ seems to recognize her urge to flee, because he pats the seat across from him and gives her a pointed look. “Sit down, Kie.”

She complies, because she kind of owes him, and JJ actually managed to cook something without burning the house down, so that itself is a miracle.

“It’s no five-star Kiara Carrera creation, but it’ll have to do,” he tells her, smiling at her as she sits down. “I only know how to cook breakfast— sorry.”

He seems almost embarrassed, but Kiara doesn’t see why. “No, I love it,” she tells him, and he just stares at her, as if he thinks she’s lying. “Really, I do.”

He grins at her then, his blue eyes sparkling in the dim lights of the Chateau, and then JJ’s digging into his own food like a starving stray dog who hasn’t had a real meal in weeks.

It smells great, even though the toast is a little burnt, and Kiara is starving, but she still hesitates before picking up her knife.

JJ notices it, because of course he does. “Eat, Kiara,” he says, his tone soft but firm. “You need it. Please.”

It’s the please that gets her. She takes a cautious bite of toast, which is burnt on one side by covered in butter. It settles in her stomach, warm and filling, and before she realizes it, she’s scraping her plate clean.

JJ doesn’t say anything, but there’s a gleam of triumph in his eyes when he takes her empty plate and places it in the sink.

She was exhausted before, but the food’s made her drowsy, and Kiara stumbles into John B’s room while JJ is washing the dishes. He’s not home, but she decides to wait until tomorrow to worry about it, if she has to. As well as a bunch of other things— like what the hell her mother is going to do with her.

Kiara’s muscles feel like they’re made out of lead as she collapses onto the bed. She’s exhausted, but her thoughts aren’t stopping, and it’s a relief when JJ appears in the doorway.

“You good?” He asks, and she hums into her pillow, not opening her eyes.

But then the floorboards creak as he turns to leave, and she doesn’t know what makes her do it, but she calls his name.

“Yeah?” JJ says, and she opens her eyes this time, studying his silhouette in the doorway, all soft lines and tousled blond curls.

“Will you stay?” She asks, before she can consider what it means, how he’ll interpret it. “I just... I don’t want to be alone right now.”

But JJ just nods, moving to the other side of the bed and lying a respectable distance away from her. He closes his eyes immediately, but Kiara can’t seem to relax. They’ve slept in the same bed before, but this feels different. Heavier.

“JJ?” She murmurs into the silence, and he hums to show that he’s listening. “Thank you. For tonight, I mean.”

“S’ no problem, Kie,” he says, his words slurred by exhaustion, eyelids drooping as he turned to look at her. “You know you can talk to me, right? About anything.”

“Yeah,” she whispered, picking at her nail polish to avoid meeting his gaze. “I know. It’s just... it’s hard, ya know? I didn’t want to bother any of you, God knows you have enough shit to deal with without me piling my own on top of it, and it wasn’t that big of a deal, I swear—”

“Kie, your shit is my shit,” JJ said, his voice firm as he reached out to take her hand. She brushed her fingers over his knuckles, comforted by the familiar pattern of the cracks and scars that had stayed there even after his cuts had healed. “I’m not going anywhere. And this... whatever it is, we’ll get through it together. All of us— John B and Pope too.”

Kiara nodded, and it was silent for a while, but then she said, “I’m sorry. About what I said, about your dad. I was out of line, and I—”

“Don’t worry about it,” JJ said, shrugging, his fingers squeezing hers in reassurance. “I shouldn’t have reacted the way I did, but... it’s just scary, Kie. It was like I was watching you slip away right in front of me, and I didn’t know how to stop it.”

Kiara didn’t know what to say to that, so she just tucked herself into his side, pressing her face into his shoulder as JJ wrapped an arm around her. Their fingers were still intertwined, resting on his chest.

“Kie,” he said after a while, when she was on the brink of sleep. “I shouldn’t have to say it, but... you know you’re fucking beautiful, right? Just the way you are. You don’t have to—

“Thanks, JJ,” Kiara whispered before he could finish, her voice catching. She told herself not to cry, but a few tears escaped anyway. JJ wiped them from her cheeks, wove his fingers into her hair, running them through her wet curls.

“No, I’m serious, you’re like really hot, I—“

Kiara laughed, swatting at his arm, even though there was no real force behind it. There was a certain warmth rising in her chest, as she breathed in JJ’s scent and fell asleep in his arms. She didn’t quite know what it was, but it was new, and she liked it.

Far more than she should have.

•••

It’s better after that. Not perfect, not right away, but better.

She explains everything to the Pogues eventually, and they take it all in stride, as if she’d just told them that she had decided to take up knitting as a pastime.

John B is always there, offering to drive her to get dinner, telling her he hasn’t eaten in days. He insists that Kie teach him how to cook fish the way they do at the Wreck, makes her taste-test each batch and critique them.

Pope does research, because that’s how he copes with this sort of thing, and after a while he starts bringing it up with her. JJ glares at him at first, asks Kiara if she wants him to stop, but she likes it. She likes knowing she’s not alone, that this is normal.

JJ’s approach is more subtle. He’s always making her food (he still can’t make toast without burning it, but she eats it anyway). Honestly, when JJ pouts and bats his eyelashes and flashes that devilish smirk of his, it’s hard to say no to anything he offers her. He makes it easy though, and that’s what she loves. It’s not awkward or forced, just them sharing a basket of fries at the Wreck, or visiting a local food truck festival in town.

She doesn’t know why she thought telling the Pogues would be a bad thing, because it’s nice not having to hide this from them, to know they’ll be there if she needs them.

Kiara doesn’t need perfect, she decides. She just needs her boys— if she has them, she’ll be fine.

No matter what happens.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> REQUESTS ARE OPEN!! comment here or leave me an ask @hmsjiara on tumblr :)


	3. glitter’s sparklin on your heart now, darling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> when kiara mentions that she’s planning to go to her first pride since coming out as pansexual alone, jj offers to come with her, and shenanigans ensue. basically just 3,000 words of jiara fluff. hope y’all enjoy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> request by @rcsales on tumblr: prompts for Jiara!!: 74. “Why don’t you just sit there and look pretty?”, 80. “How do you get your skin to be so soft?” and 92. “Are you sure we should be doing this?”
> 
> i figured i should write something fluffy after my last one shot lol, and i also wanted to write something for pride so here you go. hope you like it, thank you for the request!
> 
> also, thank you for all of the love on this work. it means more than you know :)

“Are you sure we should be doing this?”

Now, that was a first. JJ, who just last week had done a wheelie with his motorcycle off of the dock at the Chateau, telling Kiara _she_ was being reckless.

“JJ, you endanger your life on a day-to-day basis,” Kiara says, rolling her eyes. “Going to a pride rally is the safest activity you’ve done all week.”

“No, it’s just— I mean won’t your parents be pissed?” He asks, frowning at her from the passenger seat. “I heard your mom— she didn’t sound happy.”

When Kiara had come out as pansexual, her parents had been... supportive. They’d smiled and nodded and said _that’s nice, sweetheart._ But apparently, her attending a pride rally was taking it a step too far. It had escalated into a screaming match the night before, the gist being it’s fine to like girls, but talking about it publicly is crossing a line. She’d ignored it, because her parents reputations weren’t her concern, but JJ always got weird around shit like this. She’d explained it to him already: parents got mad at their kids, that was normal, they weren’t going to disown her over it. 

“It’ll be fine,” she tells him, looking over her shoulder as she backs her car up. It was well past midnight— she had decided it would be best to leave while her parents were asleep. The parade started at eleven in the morning, so she’d booked them a room at a nearby hotel. This way, she could avoid an awkward confrontation with her mother, and they’d be able to get an earlier start the next day. JJ had texted her when he was in her driveway, and she’d crept downstairs with her pre-packed bag and grabbed her keys. She’d parked her car around the corner from her house as a precaution.

Kiara had worked herself up so much trying to figure out how to tell the Pogues that she was pan that their reaction to her whiskey-triggered, blurted confession while they were chilling on the hammocks at the Chateau had been somewhat anticlimactic.

John B had smiled, told her it was cool and passed her a joint, and that was that. Pope blinked once, as if downloading the information into his brain, and then nodded like it made perfect sense. JJ, however, had frowned and said, “ _Pan_ sexual? What? Did you have like a giant crush on Peter Pan as a child?”

“No, JJ,” she’d said, trying to sound annoyed even as she gave him a fond roll of her eyes. “It means that I’m attracted to people based on who they are, not what’s between their legs.”

“Oh, well we knew _that_ ,” he’d said, shrugging, his eyes glazed and hazy from the alcohol and weed as he stared at her. “So, what I’m gathering is... this means that even though you were macking on that Kook chic last week at the Boneyard, I still have a chance?”

Pope had shoved him out of the hammock, and JJ had fallen to the ground with a grunt. John B threw a towel at his head, but Kiara just laughed, rolled her eyes.

It was the usual JJ pigheadedness she was used to, but she had felt strangely comforted by it in that moment. She’d been so afraid they’d treat her differently, but the Pogues had acted like her announcing her sexuality was barely news at all.

It was a nice change from her parents, and even though JJ’s initial reaction had been utterly idiotic, since then he’d been nothing but supportive.

So, when Kiara mentioned that she was going to her first Pride alone, he’d volunteered to come and keep her company.

It was sweet, the kind of gesture JJ was prone to masking with cocky remarks and his usual deflections surrounding anything to do with emotions. 

Either way, JJ certainly makes the trip more entertaining. It’s late, and the drive would normally be boring and lonely, but he hooks up her phone to the aux and blasts her Pride playlist. He keeps flipping through the songs, unable to choose one, but he finally settles on _Born This Way_ by Lady Gaga. 

JJ’s carpool karaoke is actually impressive— he can sing, which she knew, but there’s something about him screaming Gaga lyrics that makes Kiara’s heart jump. Then, _Vogue_ by Madonna comes on, and he rolls down the window and starts screaming the words at passing cars. She has to tell him to stop, uses driver veto power to roll up the window, because he’s distracting, and she doesn’t want to start the weekend off by getting in a car crash. 

The drive is already three hours long, but JJ insists that they stop for Taco Bell even though he’s already had dinner, claiming that it’s the least she can do, which Kiara finds ironic since he was the one who offered to come with her. 

Their arrival at the hotel is just as chaotic as she expected. Kiara checks them in, her duffel bag on JJ’s shoulder as he whispers comments in her ear about the lobby’s patrons. She has to swat his hand away from the candy bowl, gives the receptionist a slightly manic, apologetic smile.

The woman’s own smile seems genuine, and as she hands them their keys she shakes her head and says, “I hope it’s not too forward, but you two make an _adorable_ couple.”

Kiara opens her mouth to correct her, but JJ throws an arm around her shoulders and steers her away from the desk before she can protest.

“You hear that, Kie?” He asks as they wait for the elevator to arrive, his arm still on her shoulders, his breath warm against her ear. “She thinks we make a cute couple.”

She shoves him away from her, threatens to lock him out of the hotel room as a punishment. He pulls the key card from his pocket, somehow having swiped it from her, and she regrets it instantly when he presses every elevator button in retaliation. She tries to stop him, but he blocks her with an arm, and Kiara refuses to jump to reach the card he’s now holding above his head. 

Instead, she moves to the other side of the elevator and pretends to be pissed, giving him the silent treatment. 

JJ starts apologizing by the seventh floor, and is looking throughouly ashamed by the tenth. She considers it a job well done, but his embarrassment only lasts for the duration of the elevator ride, and he’s racing her to the room when the door opens. 

She swears traveling with JJ is like traveling with a five-year-old. Actually, the five year old would likely be better behaved. And she can’t put JJ in time-out if he annoys her.

Kiara had purchased the hotel room before she’d known JJ was coming, upgraded it to two beds when he’d told her. She’d convinced him it was too much of a hassle to split the bill, reminded him he was technically doing her a favor by coming and she should get the chance to repay it. The truth was, she had more than enough money, and she wasn’t going to let him spend his limited amount of cash on an expensive hotel room. It wasn’t like she required this kind of shit, she would have been just as content staying in a trashy motel, this was just safer and closer to the parade. 

Still, when they enter the room, with it’s two queen beds and an en suite bathroom, the floor to ceiling windows showing a view of the city below, the PNC Plaza towering above the other buildings, and JJ goes quiet, she understands it’s because he’s never been in a place like this before. 

He seems almost unsure of himself and some people might consider it embarrassing, but to be honest Kiara finds it endearing. He asks her which bed was his, and when she tells him he can pick, he beams at her like a child who’s just been given a free lollipop. He flops down on the bed by the window, his boots hitting the white sheets, and Kiara knows that her mother would faint if she saw it. 

She had assumed that they would both be tired from the drive, but JJ is as restless as ever, unable to sit still as he examines every part of the room. She takes a shower while he explores, has to forbid him from going to the hotel pool at four am when he asks through the door, reminds him that they have to be up by nine.

JJ had rolled his eyes when she told him, said it was unnecessary to leave two hours before the parade started, but when she came out he was still lying on his bed, scrolling through Instagram on his phone.  
  
She’s brushing her hair when he says, “Do we have signs?”

“What?” She asks, frowning at him. 

JJ looks at her, eyebrows raised. “Did you seriously forget to bring _signs_? Isn’t that like the one thing you bring to a parade?” 

Kiara stays silent, and he seems to understand that it‘s an admission of guilt. Okay, so she was bound to forget something, this just happened to be it.

“I’ll be right back,” he says, sighing as he grabs her keys off of the the table and starts typing something into his phone.

“Where are you—“

“Don’t worry about it.”

Kiara wants to tell him that she _has_ to worry, because it involves him, but he‘s gone before she can say anything.

She shakes her head, resigned to the fact that JJ is almost an adult and that she can’t really control him. Even if the idea of her reckless friend driving her car to an unknown location in the middle of the night makes her nervous.

She decides to try and relax, changing into one of the hotels fluffy bathrobes and applying a sparkly face mask while JJ isn’t there to tease her about it.

When she hears the lock click, she’s lying in bed, making a list for the morning on her phone. 

JJ bursts through the door, and it takes her a second to comprehend the sight of him with an armful of colored paper, glitter, and markers.

“What did you _do_?”

“Posters,” he says with a shrug, as if that explains it. “I went to a drug store to get supplies, since you were unprepared. ‘Cmon, Kie, get your ass over here.”

It was the same quiet, subtle consideration that had made him come with her, and Kiara had always admired that about JJ— his life was hell, but he hadn’t let that damage his character, his natural instinct to help the people he cared about.

So, she pats the spot beside her on the bed, let’s JJ lay out his supplies, and spends the next two hours telling him to put caps on markers and fighting over tubes of rainbow glitter. 

She ends up making her sign the colors of the pan flag, writes the words _Pan and Proud_ on it. JJ is strangely secretive about his, and she starts to get nervous when he is hiding it from her, but she smiles when he turns and she sees the words _Hearts Not Parts_ written out in different shades of glitter.

He grins at her reaction, starts searching for a marker to sign his name, and she has a moment where she is studying him: lounging beside her in nothing but a pair of grey sweatpants, blonde curls mussed from running his fingers through his hair, his lips between his teeth as he focuses on writing his name, and she thinks about how easy it would be to lean over and press her lips to his. 

But she ignores that urge, excuses herself to the bathroom and splashes cold water on her face, and when she returns JJ is in his own bed, finally ready to go to sleep.

The bed seems colder without him, but she resists the desire to ask him to join her again. Because they were just friends, and she wasn’t going to ruin the weekend by being selfish.

 _The problem, ironically,_ she thinks as she stares at his sign, _is that JJ’s heart is exactly what’s made her like him so damn much._

•••

The next morning is more hectic than she wanted it to be, but with JJ, she should have expected it.

Kiara had built an extra hour into their schedule just for this purpose, but she sleeps through her alarm and wakes up thirty minutes before the parade starts. 

She trips on JJ’s discarded boots when she stumbles out of bed, swears as she almost face-plants on the hotel floor, shakes JJ a little harder than necessary to wake him up.

They end up sharing the bathroom as they’re getting ready, and Kiara complains about the steam from his shower ruining her hair, yells at him for getting in her way. JJ is still ready twenty minutes before her, and he lays on the bed while she’s panicking, infuriatingly calm. 

Kiara’s so flustered that she forgets her car keys, but JJ grabs them, pushes the elevator button with a pointed look at her wedged heels. 

Okay, so they’re not the most parade appropriate attire, but at least they’re cute. Kiara’s shirt, which reads _easily distracted by all genders_ , is tucked into her jean skirt, and her hair is braided with rainbow beads, her eyeshadow a blended version of the colors in the pan flag. 

She spent a good deal of time selecting her outfit, but when she gets to the car, she realizes that she’s overlooked one crucial thing: JJ.

Besides the sign, there’s nothing to distinguish him as a member of Pride, so she insists on pulling out her glitter when they’ve arrived at the parade and parked on the side of the street. 

She thought he would refuse, but JJ just says he’ll do it if he can do hers as well. She agrees, and then they’re brushing rainbow glitter on each other’s cheeks, leaning over the console so that their faces are inches apart. JJ keeps moving, tapping his fingers against the seat, bouncing his legs, reaching up to itch his nose so that Kiara has to swat his hand away.

She just tries not to think about his fingers on her face, how the blue glitter on his cheeks makes his eyes pop. 

JJ is adorably focused, eyes narrowed as he applies the glitter, and then he says, “How do you get your skin to be so soft?” 

Kiara shivers as he brushes a finger over her cheekbone, as if he can’t help himself. “It’s called moisturizer, JJ,” she explains, smirking at him as she starts to list all of the skincare products she uses. JJ loses interest soon enough, applying a little more blue and pink glitter and then declaring that his work is finished. 

To her surprise, they make it to the parade with time to spare. It was as if a rainbow had exploded on the streets of the city, everyone was carrying signs and laughing and dancing and getting brightly-colored drinks from the stands lining the sides of the road. The sun is shining above, and Kiara starts looking at the UV index on her phone, tries to make JJ put on sunscreen. He refuses, says it will mess with the glitter, let’s out a cry of outrage when she presses dollops of it onto his cheeks anyway.

She thought he would be uncomfortable surrounded by all of it, but JJ seems perfectly at ease, studying their surroundings with genuine interest and curiosity. They buy drinks from the vendors who barely glance at Kiara’s fake ID, which makes sense since the alcohol is basically water compared to what the Pogues ingest on a daily basis. 

A few people compliment their signs, and music is blasting from the speakers, and Kiara finds that she’s actually able to relax, laughing as JJ spins her around with an arm.

They get food from the trucks, JJ buying anything with the word _meat_ in it while she opts for fish tacos. He chugs from the water bottle she brought them, the one he insisted they didn’t need, makes Kiara do a Jell-O shot.

It escalates from there, until they end up at a bar, exhausted and sun-soaked, and Kiara takes off her heels and rests her sore legs on JJ’s lap under the bar while he orders them drinks. He claims the beer will help with the ache in her feet, and it does, because thirty minutes later Kiara has pulled him away from the bar and onto the dance floor. They’re both a few drinks in at this point, and although Kiara hates it, her weight means she gets drunk faster than he does, so she’s reasonably tipsy. 

It’s a blur of laughter and bright colors and rainbow face paint, all writhing limbs and bodies bumping hers. Someone calls for shots, and Kiara screams at the top of her lungs, slips her hand into JJ’s and raises their arms into the air. 

Eventually, a girl with a warm smile and tan skin, her blonde curls dyed pink, grabs Kiara’s hand and starts dancing with her, hips rolling and tongue out between purple-lipstick painted lips. JJ just watches them without commenting, sips from his drink, raises his eyebrows when Kiara starts grinding on her. 

The girl tugs her towards the bar, and Kiara follows, tells JJ where she’s going over her shoulder. 

“Kie,” he whines, pouting at her. “What am _I_ supposed to do? Just stand here while you go hook up with her in the bathroom?”

“Why don’t you just sit there and look pretty?”

He glares at her as she shoots a pointed look at the glitter on his face, but Kiara just laughs, leaves him standing in the middle of the dance floor.

She returns a few minutes later, a purple lipstick print on her cheek, and JJ pretends to be pissed at her, gives her the cold shoulder as the girl lays her arms on Kiara’s shoulders and starts swaying her hips. 

But then a boy with black shorts and no shirt appears, a rainbow painted on his chest, screaming as he runs his hands through his brown curls and knocks back a shot of tequila. He’s obviously hammered, but it doesn’t make it any less hilarious when he wraps an arm around JJ and hugs him, presses a kiss to his cheek. “You’re adorable,” he whispers in his ear, nuzzling into JJ’s neck. “Wanna fuck?”

“Uh, no, er, I’m good thanks—“

Both Kiara and the girl she’s dancing with start cackling as the boy stumbles away, giggling at JJ’s dumbstruck expression. 

Kiara throws herself at him, wraps her arms around his neck, the buzz from the tequila allowing her to whisper the words _wanna fuck?_ in his ear. 

He doesn’t push her away like she thought he would, instead he tugs her closer and let’s her take a sip of his drink, press a kiss to his cheek.

In fact, after that, they don’t stop touching.

JJ stands behind her at the bar to keep people from bumping into her, and Kiara sits on his lap when they return to their seats, clings to his hand when they eventually stumble from the bar and into an Uber. They’ll pick up her car tomorrow, she thinks faintly, when the world stops spinning. 

Kiara has rainbow glitter in her hair and her feet feel like they’re about to fall off her body, but her chest is filled with this strange, warm feeling that only grows when she rests her head on JJ’s shoulder and says, “Thank you.”

“For what?” He asks, glancing at her, his blue eyes heavy with exhaustion and alcohol, his voice softer than usual.

“For this,” she tells him, gesturing to herself, the signs at their feet. “For today. For always accepting me for who I am.”

It’s cheesy, and they don’t _do_ cheesy, but she’s drunk and JJ doesn’t seem to mind as he presses a kiss to her forehead. “Always, Kie. You don’t have to worry about that.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> requests are always open :) @hmsjiara on tumblr or here in the comments


	4. knight in shining armor (he wants to be my lover)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a 3 + 1 for the three times jj protected kie, and the one time she protected him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> @Amy247: Please have some hurt Kie and protective JJ! I also love how you included the other pogues, please keep that up!  
> @RosieMae: It seemed like Kie and Rafe have some sort of weird history, please can you do one about that and JJ finding out and getting protective and concerned?  
> @XiQ1108: I’d love to see you write one about Kiara comforting JJ maybe he goes back to his dad’s house to get some things after John B and Sarah’s disappearance, JJ’s been staying at the Chateau and he just wants to get his things and Luke gets violent with him. 
> 
> i decided to combine these three requests because i wanted to do a 3 + 1 with jj and kiara protecting each other at different points throughout their lives. i’m sorry there isn’t that much of the other pogues in this, but i hope that you enjoy it anyway! thank you all for the requests!
> 
> also sorry for the delay in getting this up! i have a bunch of requests to get to, but i’m slowly making my way through them. i promise that if you request something, it will get posted eventually! 
> 
> trigger warnings: mentions and heavy descriptions of abuse, implied/referenced sexual assault and slight non-con.

  
From the beginning of her friendship with the Pogues, Kiara had made it clear that it wasn’t their job to protect her. 

Even then, she knew it was a slightly impossible situation, because they were three testosterone-filled teenage boys who all kind of had a thing for her at some point, and it was inevitable that one of them would try and play her knight in shining white armor.

She’d once thought that it would be John B, with his warm smile and big heart, or maybe Pope because he always seemed to care the most, but she had never expected JJ to be the person who got protective on her behalf.

Sure, he was reckless, and always itching for a fight, but she’d assumed that was just JJ being JJ— there was no higher purpose, no method behind his madness.

The first time Kiara gets a glimpse of the truth behind his sharp remarks and killer right-hook, they’re barely even friends. It was a few months after she’d first started hanging out with the Pogues, back when she still went to school with them, before JJ had accepted her into his inner circle.

They’re at a party at the Boneyard, and Kiara’s a few drinks in, so when a Kook with sand-colored hair and perfect teeth starts dancing with her, she doesn’t push him away.

Kiara loves to dance, loves moving her body to the rhythm of the music, how carefree and confident it makes her feel, so she doesn’t typically object when Tourons or even Kooks want to join her. She would prefer one of the Pogues, but John B is flirting with a girl by the fire, and Pope is _attempting_ to flirt by talking about something disturbing that he probably shouldn’t be, and JJ is no where to be seen. 

It’s fun for a while— the beat picks up, and the shots of tequila they did at the Chateau are definitely helping her to relax, to wrap an arm around the boy’s neck and start grinding on him.

But then the song ends, and Kiara slips from the group of dancers, shrugs the boy’s arm off of her shoulder and turns to find one of the Pogues, suggest that they head back to the Chateau for the evening.

His hand closes around her wrist, though, yanking her back towards him. “Wait,” he says, frowning at her, shaking his head like he’s confused. “You’re leaving? But I thought—”

Kiara smiles, pats the hand on her arm. “Listen, this was fun, but my friends are waiting. See you around, k?”

She turns to leave again, but he doesn’t let go of her wrist, and it burns when she tries to pull away from him.

“Hey, what—”

“Come back to my place,” he insists, and that’s when she notices how he’s slurring his words, his glazed eyes. “My parents are out of town, it’ll be fun, I promise—”

“That’s very nice of you,” she says, biting her lip, searching for any sign of the Pogues. Because this feels awfully like the kind of situation they talk about in health class, how you should never walk home from a party alone and always make sure someone is watching your drink. “But I have plans, so...”

The boy growls, actually _growls_ at her, his hand going tighter on her wrist, and Kiara faintly registers the pain that flares there. “Listen, sweetheart, we had a fun time tonight, right? Don’t ruin it.”

“Then _let go of me_ ,” Kiara hisses, trying to seem confident and unbothered, but her wrist hurts and she’s pretty sure it’s going to bruise, and she hates herself for it but she’s starting to get scared. Because the boy’s eyes are gleaming with something dangerous, and he won’t let go of her, and she can’t see the Pogues anywhere. 

“You’re the one who wanted to dance with me, grinding on me like a fucking slut—”  
  
Kiara flinches, but before she can retaliate, JJ’s fist slams into his jaw.

It’s instinctual to scream, to clap her hands over her mouth as the boy’s hand vanishes from her wrist and he falls to the ground.

JJ’s standing next to her, his breathing harsh but even as he stares at the boy lying on the sand, clutching his hands to his face and groaning in pain. Kiara knows that JJ can land a punch, has seen him do it before, but this is different, because he’s never hit someone to defend her before.

“You okay, Kiara?” JJ asks her, his voice tight with rage, eyes not leaving the limp form of the boy at their feet. 

He’s still howling, and there’s blood gushing from his nose, but Kiara doesn’t feel too bad considering her wrist is starting to throb. 

It takes her a moment to answer, because she’s still not used to this version of JJ, the one who seems to care about what happens to her. 

“Yeah,” she says, nodding at him, shaking off the fear that had left her stunned and shaky. “I’m good.”

The boy scrambles to his feet, teeth bared through the blood covering his face, and lunges at JJ, but he’s on the ground again before he can even get a hit in, JJ dodging his fist as his own collides with the guy’s stomach. 

“What the hell?” He groans, glaring up at JJ, though Kiara notices he doesn’t try to rise again. “What was that for?”

Kiara scoffs, rolls her eyes, but JJ’s gaze hardens and he kneels down until he’s practically spitting in the guy’s face. _“Apologize.”_

The boy’s attention goes to Kiara, then back to JJ, and she detects a flicker of fear in his eyes, but he’s still not sounding very apologetic when he glares at JJ and says, “If she hadn’t been acting like a _fucking tease_ —“

JJ moves faster than she can see, kicking the boy in the side. He grunts, moaning, and Kiara decides that it’s enough. The last thing they need is for someone to call the cops. 

“JJ, it’s fine,” she says, taking a step closer, unsure whether or not she should touch him. She’s seen him get like this before, knows how volatile he can be, but she still doesn’t think he’d intentionally hurt her. “I’m okay, let’s just—”

“No, Kiara, it’s not fine!” He shouts, and she almost flinches at the rage lining every inch of his body, the dark, empty look in his eyes, but then she sees the emotion behind it, the raw pain that lingers in his gaze. “He almost—“

“I’m _fine_ ,” she says again, laying a hand on his arm, running her thumb over his skin until he relaxes under her grip. “He barely touched me, and you got there before anything else could happen. Let’s just go, I want to go back to the Chateau. John B and Pope are waiting.”

At the mention of their friends, some of the blind rage fades from JJ’s gaze, but not all of it. Kiara thinks she knows what this is about, because she’s not as oblivious as JJ thinks she is, and she understands there’s a reason his mother left before he turned ten, why his fists clenched that one time they walked by a girl with bruises on her face and her boyfriend’s arm around her waist. This kind of thing is personal for him, makes him remember a time when he couldn’t do anything to stop it. It’s why it’s so hard for him to walk away.

Kiara takes a step closer, until they’re practically chest to chest, places her hands on either side of his face, makes sure that he’s looking at her. “JJ, I’m fine. Let’s go.”

JJ shivers, stares at her with this unreadable expression. Kiara doesn’t think they’ve ever been this close before, and if they had, it was never like this. She tells herself it’s not the time to get flustered, silences the voice in the back of her head that tells her this would be the perfect opportunity to kiss someone. You know, if she wanted to. Which she doesn’t.

Not that JJ punching someone had been hot, or anything. Not at all.

Apparently, her proximity is enough to snap JJ out of his rage-induced stupor, and nods his head, sags slightly in Kiara’s grip. 

JJ lands a last kick to the boy’s ribs, and Kiara makes a sound of protest, but he turns around a moment later, wraps an arm around her shoulders and leads her back to the van.

She doesn’t say thank you until later, when they’re standing in the kitchen at the Chateau, and JJ’s arm is in her lap and she’s tending to the cut on his hand.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” she says, quietly, but they both know that she doesn’t really mean it. “I could have handled it.”

“I know,” JJ answers, but his eyes are on her bruised wrist and there’s still that emptiness behind them, so she presses a kiss to his cheek.

“Thank you,” she whispers after, once there’s a bandage on her wrist and they’re sitting on the pullout couch with the other Pogues watching old NCIS reruns.

JJ doesn’t say anything, but she sees the smile he tries to hide, the slight redness to his cheeks.

He’s not a knight in shining armor, not by a long shot, but Kiara doesn’t care. She likes JJ exactly the way he is, likes that he shows all of himself and doesn’t apologize for it.

And if she has to stop herself from telling him that, from pressing her lips to his that night in the Boneyard... well, that’s her own business, isn’t it? 

•••

That’s the first time JJ protects her, but it definitely isn’t the last. 

He’s always there when a Kook insults her at a party, when the girls in her grade make a hate page for Kiara during her Sophomore year or laugh at her from behind their menus at the Wreck, purposefully drop silverware or napkins on the floor just to watch her pick them up. 

Even though JJ isn’t someone who objects to violence, he’s just as quick with his mouth as he is with his fists. It normally only takes one sharp comment to make the girls stop laughing, the threat of a hit to silence the boys who whistle and howl at Kiara in her bikini as they drive past their yachts on the HMS Pogue. 

JJ likes to have an opponent, she notices, someone to target his aggression at. It’s easy for him, when there’s something to fight.

It’s not like that the day Kiara falls off of her board at Rixon’s Cove, doesn’t surface when it appears, bobbing on the waves. Because JJ can’t fight the ocean, and there’s no one to blame but Kiara for her wipeout. 

After, Pope tells her how JJ panicked, dove into the water without a second thought, yelled at John B to grab Kiara’s board where it was drifting on top of the waves. 

He pulled her from the ocean, Kiara still choking on the water that had filled her lungs, head throbbing from where it had struck her board.

She doesn’t remember a lot from the next few minutes, has a vague memory of the warmth of JJ’s skin against her cheek and his arms around her, him whispering that it would be fine, that she was okay. 

She’s more aware once they get into the van, her back against JJ’s chest as Pope examines the bump on her head, says she should get it checked out in the morning but that she’ll be fine as long as she rests and can keep some food and water down. Kiara insists that she’s okay, tells the Pogues not to call her parents, though she appreciates the hand JJ offers her once they pull into the driveway at the Chateau.

Because she’s still a little unsteady on her feet, has to clutch the doorway to the bathroom on her way to the shower, bites her lip to keep herself from groaning. But Kiara doesn’t want to worry the Pogues, doesn’t need them fussing over her.

They seem reluctant to leave her alone, asking if she’s okay through the door, what kind of pizza she wants, if her head still hurts. Kiara tries to reassure them that she’s fine, and John B and Pope seem to buy it, but JJ takes one look at her when she steps out of the bathroom wearing a pair of John B’s sweatpants and Pope’s t-shirt and pats the spot on the couch next to him, pulls her close until her head is practically in his lap.

This kind of casual, physical affection with JJ is new, something he never would have initiated a few months ago. He’s always been like that with the other Pogues— his hands in John B’s hair, an arm around Pope’s shoulder. With Kiara, it was more calculated: offering to help her out of the boat, his fingers brushing hers as he handed her a beer. 

She knows it’s a marker of how comfortable he feels with someone, a representation of JJ being able to let his guard down. And it shouldn’t matter to her so much, shouldn’t leave her skin flushed and butterflies fluttering in her stomach, but it does. 

So, yes, Kiara’s motives may not be entirely pure she whines about her head hurting and makes JJ get her pizza and Advil, insists he give her his sweatshirt when she starts to get cold, guides his fingers into her hair and tugs him down onto the pullout beside her when her eyelids start to droop with exhaustion.

It doesn’t matter, though, and it’s not like anyone notices. Because that’s just what friends do, right? 

And that’s what she and JJ are. Friends. 

•••

Kiara’s not really sure when her complicated relationship with Rafe became a secret. 

It’s not even a _relationship_. It’s not anything, really, just one of the broken fragments from her Kook Year that she prefers not to examine too closely.

Because, yes, she might have gotten drunk one night after Sarah ditched her, stumbled into the Cameron’s backyard and sat by the pool until Rafe found her, woken up in his bed with a pounding headache and his arm around her bare waist, but it doesn’t really matter. Or maybe it does, and she just likes to pretend otherwise.

Because it’s embarrassing that Kiara doesn’t really remember what happened, that she was such a mess over Sarah that she somehow stumbled into Rafe’s bed. Who’s disgusting, and vile, and against everything she stands for.

Kiara never tells the Pogues, buries her blurry, faded memories of that night in the same metaphorical box that contains her memories of Sarah. 

It’s easy to avoid Rafe at first, to hide behind the Pogues whenever he shows up at the Boneyard, ignore how his eyes catch on any exposed skin. She starts wearing pants when she works at the Wreck, tugs her skirt a little lower when he passes her in the hallway at school or sits behind her in class. Kiara hates herself for it, for adjusting her behavior to accommodate him, but what else is she supposed to do? 

As long as no one notices, she’ll be fine. 

But secrets have a way of getting out, and as their hunt for the gold starts to escalate, the closer they get to Sarah Cameron, ignoring Rafe gets harder and harder.

He corners Kiara at the movie night, asks how she is, gets in her personal space. Kiara hates that she recoils, how every bone in her body is itching to walk away and return to the familiar safety the Pogues offer. And when he wraps his arms around her waist and pulls her off of Topper, she flinches, struggling against his grip, revolted by the feeling of his hands on her.

Later, Kiara can’t help but wonder how drunk she had to be to let him touch her. 

It feels like a tsunami building at the back of her mind, triggered by every glimpse she gets of him, every brief encounter. She doesn’t know how to stop it, just hopes that when it inevitably crashes, she can keep it contained. 

It happens after Midsummers, when Kiara and JJ are sitting in the van outside of her house after leaving John B at the hospital. She’s still wearing her dress, as well as the sweatshirt JJ gave her when she was shaking and trembling in the hospital waiting room. They were bullied into going home by the hospital staff, or else they would have stayed. The nurse they’d spoken to had promised them John B would be fine, that he was out of surgery and that they would be able to visit him in the morning. 

They’re just sitting in silence, already having dropped Pope off at his place, the sound of crickets chirping and the hum of the generator outside Kiara’s house soothing after the night they’ve had.

Kiara still feels numb, her face red and splotchy from scrubbing her face clean in the hospital bathroom, her dress wrinkled from her clutching too hard at the fabric. It all feels a little surreal: their adrenaline-filled escape at Midsummers, Topper pushing John B from the Hawk’s Nest, Sarah crying over his body and pressing a kiss to his lips, the harsh reality of the hospital waiting room.

So, when JJ turns to her and says, _I ran into Rafe tonight,_ it’s the last thing she needs or wants to hear.

Kiara eyes the bruises on his face, realizes there’s more than when she last saw him getting shoved into a cop car, focuses on that to distract herself from the growing pit of anxiety in her stomach. “Did he do that to you?”

“Ah, no, this was just—“ JJ pauses, falters, bites his lip like he always does before he lies. “This is nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

Normally, Kiara would push, but she doesn’t have the energy to fight with JJ in that moment. So she nods, stays quiet, waits for him to continue.

“He and Kelce cornered me at the party,” he explains, and if Kiara was being more observant, she would have noticed how he was suddenly avoiding her gaze. “He said something. About you. And I just... I lost it.”

Kiara freezes, her heart jumping to her throat, forces herself to breathe past the panic constricting her lungs. She would like to be able to say that Rafe wouldn’t tell anyone about them, but that’s honestly exactly his style. Especially if he thought it would get a rise out of JJ. 

“What did he say?” She asks quietly, biting her lip.

“Doesn’t matter,” JJ says, still not looking directly at her. “It just got me thinking... did anything ever, you know happen between you two?”

“I don’t know.”

Kiara says the words without thinking, and she knows she’s made a mistake when JJ’s brow furrows and he frowns at her. “What do you mean, you don’t know?”

Kiara starts picking at the nail polish on her fingers, not wanting to look at JJ while she explains. “Rafe was always kind of... there, you know, when I would hang out with Sarah. He gave me the creeps, so I usually avoided him, but there was one night. I was drunk, and I wandered over to the Cameron’s, probably to confront Sarah, and he was there. I woke up the next morning in his bed and I— I couldn’t remember what happened, so.”

Kiara stops talking, stuttering out the last few words, embarrassment flooding her. God, she sounds so stupid. What the hell was JJ going to think of her? It was no secret that he and the Pogues hated Rafe. 

She jumps when JJ reaches over to take her hand, sees the rage burning in his eyes. Kiara knew it wasn’t directed at her.

“You know that’s wrong, right Kie?” JJ asked, and she could tell he was fighting to keep his voice even. “He shouldn’t have— God, that fucking bastard... he shouldn’t have taken advantage of you like that.”

She nods, wanting to believe him, though there is still a part of her that thinks it might be partially her fault. She’d made Rafe want her, right? And she could preach feminism and women’s rights all she wanted, but she hadn’t exactly stood up for herself when it came to him, had she?

She doesn’t realize that she‘s crying until JJ’s hand tightens on her wrist, until she hears him saying her name over and over again, his voice thick with worry. Normally, she would have pretended that everything was fine, but after the night they’d had and the panic she’d felt over John B, it didn’t take much to send her over the edge. 

And she’d never really cried over Rafe, never had someone to tell her that what he’d done was wrong.

So it’s easy to fall against JJ’s chest, let him wrap his arms around her and rub soothing circles against the bare skin of her back. JJ’s style of comforting someone has never been very verbal, which she appreciates, because she honestly doesn’t feel like talking.

He asks her if she wants him to kill Rafe for her, and she knows that he’s joking, but she still smiles against his chest and shakes her head. 

She can take care of herself, she knows that, but sometimes it’s just nice to know that someone cares about _her_. Because JJ’s not playing the hero right now, not trying to seem like a tough guy.

He’s just... there, and it’s all she really needs. 

•••

Until their hunt for the gold, Kiara had never considered JJ to be someone who needed protecting.

 _He_ was always the protector. Not just of her, but for Pope and John B too. 

But after the night where he’d cried in her arms inside of the hot tub, when she’d seen the bruises covering his stomach... Kiara had felt an automatic, instinctual urge to make sure JJ never got hurt like that again.

Part of it is motivated by guilt, because there’d been so many years where she hadn’t noticed, ignored every sign that was shoved in her face. The bruises that appeared far too often, how he flinched away from casual physical contact. 

The second part is that JJ has always protected her, and she feels like she has to return the favor.

But Kiara always seems to fail when it comes to JJ, and in the blur of days that follow John B and Sarah’s disappearance (not their deaths, because Kiara can’t quite handle using that word yet), JJ kind of just... slips through the cracks.

Kiara can barely take care of herself, and every time she sees JJ he’s at the Chateau, so she assumes that he’s okay, that she doesn’t need to worry. 

She’s wrong. 

Kiara is half asleep when the rock hits her window. It takes her a minute to understand what’s happening, to pull back the covers and stumble from the bed, fumbling with the lock on her window when she sees JJ standing below.

“JJ?” She hisses, squinting at him in the dark, trying to figure out why he‘s at her house in the middle of the night. “What are you doing here?”

Between the late hour and the rain-thick air, it’s difficult to see him. JJ was leaning against the tree by her window, wearing his red baseball hat and a long-sleeve t-shirt, soaked from the downpour that had started earlier in the evening. 

She waited for his answer, the flirtatious comment about keeping her company or warming her bed, but it never came.

Instead, JJ took a step forward, a hand pressed to his abdomen as he winced, and that’s when she saw his face, the side of his jaw that was more bruise than skin. 

Kiara swore, whirled around and threw open her bedroom door, hurried down the stairs and to the front of her house. The panic was hot and tight in her chest, because she’d had nightmares about this exact scenario, the only difference being that at least JJ was alive in this version of reality.

She unlocks the front door, shoves her feet into her shoes, and she‘s at his side in an instant, surveying the damage. She sees why he didn’t answer her before— JJ’s swaying on his feet, can barely stand on his own. He flinches when she gets close, relaxes slightly once he realizes who she is. 

His clothes hide the worst of it, as they always do, but they can’t conceal the bruises covering his face, his split lip or the jilted way he‘s walking, the whimper that escapes his lips when Kiara wraps an arm around his waist to guide him inside.

She swears as she struggles to hold JJ’s weight and open the door, trips over her own feet in the front hall. JJ tries to help as best as he can, but it seems to be difficult for him to even keep his eyes open. 

“I’m fine, Kie,” he mumbles into her shoulder, slurring his words as they reach the top of the stairs. “You don’t have to—”

“You’re damn right, I have to,” she hisses back, far too aware of the fact that her parents are sleeping just down the hall. If they catch them like this... they wouldn’t turn JJ away, not when he looks like this, but it would certainly mean hospitals and social workers and foster care. It’s not what JJ wants, and she knows it’s selfish, but Kiara can’t lose anymore of her friends. She can’t lose him. 

Finally, she manages to get them both into the upstairs bathroom, maneuvering a now-pliant JJ to lean against the bathtub while she rummages through the drawers to find first aid supplies. She doesn’t like how familiar she’s gotten with patching her friends up, how she knows exactly where the gauze and painkillers are. 

The bathroom lights make JJ’s injuries look so much worse. 

She’d already seen that the entire left side of his face was bruised, that there was a cut on his cheek and his lip was split, but now she could see the imprint of hands on his neck, how he winced with every breath. Not to mention the fact that he was covered in water and mud, shaking from head to foot. 

If this is what JJ thinks _fine_ looks like, she doesn’t want to see what _not fine_ is. 

“JJ,” she whispers, not wanting to touch him without his permission. “I need to get you cleaned up, okay? Can I do that?“

He hums quietly, blinks sluggishly at her, and Kiara takes that as a go-ahead. 

She pries his boots from his feet, pulls his soaked socks off and leaves them lying on the now mud-stained tile floor. But then she gets to his shirt, and she hesitates. 

“JJ?” She murmurs, careful to keep her voice quiet and steady, her movements slow so that she doesn’t startle him. “Can I take your shirt off?”

He looks at her through damp blond lashes, and whatever he sees on her face must convince him that she’s just trying to help, because he nods his head, goes to remove the damp t-shirt himself.

JJ winces, likely from the ribs she’s sure are bruised if not broken, and Kiara carefully guides his hands away from his stomach, takes the edges of the shirt and tug it over his head. 

She doesn’t mean to gasp, doesn’t want JJ to feel any more uncomfortable than he probably already is, but she can’t stop the sound for escaping at the sight of his chest covered in a gruesome pattern of purple and blue, as if someone had used him as their personal punching bag. 

Kiara had hoped his injuries were just the result of another fight, but this... the handprints on his neck were bigger than any teenage boys, and she’d never seen JJ come out of a fight with a Kook this badly. No, this... this was his father. 

Which meant he’d done the one thing she’d counted on him _not_ doing. He’d gone home.

She also realizes that the only reason he’s here is because John B isn’t, that the one person he’d always counted on was gone, and her heart breaks even more for JJ in that moment. He deserves better, deserves more than this. 

Kiara forces herself to compartmentalize, to ignore the ache in her chest and focus on what JJ needs.

He’s quiet now, eyes half-lidded with exhaustion. But his skin is still cold and damp, and she decides that the first order of business is to get him warm. 

She leaves his shorts on, because she’s honestly not sure if she can manage to get him out of them when he’s practically dead weight against her, turns the shower handle until the waters practically boiling, pulls JJ to his feet and guides him into the tub. 

He groans as the warm water hits his bruised skin, tilts his head back into the spray. But he’s still swaying on his feet, and the last thing she needs is for him to fall and get a concussion, so Kiara climbs in beside him and wraps an arm around his waist to keep him standing. 

“Is this okay?” She asks, afraid that she’s hurting him. 

“Yeah,” he mumbles, nodding his head. “Thanks, Kie.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

She gets a washcloth and runs in carefully over his skin, apologizes every time he winces, squeezes a dollop of her favorite conditioner into her hands and massages it into his scalp. JJ leans into her touch for the first time all night, practically purrs when Kiara starts moving her fingers through his hair. She thinks he might fall asleep standing up at one point, has to shake him awake as she turns off the tap. 

She manages to get JJ out of the tub and dries him with a towel, helps him into a clean pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt despite his weak, mumbled protests. She knows it’s evidence to how badly he’s hurting, because JJ is never this willing to accept help. 

He doesn’t even protest when she offers him the bed, collapses on top of the comforter and closes his eyes. 

Kiara goes to the bathroom to clean up, changes into a dry pair of clothes, keeping quiet to avoid waking her parents. She takes the first aid kit from the drawer, returns to her bedroom and places a hand on JJ’s shoulder to see if he’s still awake. 

He flinches away from her, his gaze immediately apologetic, but Kiara shakes her head before he can say he’s sorry. “Don’t worry about it, J. It’s just me— I should have warned you, I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, Kie,” he mumbles, voice heavy with sleep. She feels guilty for waking him, especially when he winces as he moves to lean back against the headboard, but she doesn’t want to leave his wounds till morning. “What’s up? I can move, it’s okay, I’ll just go—“

“No,” she says, a little sharper than she means to, clamping another hand around his wrist. “You can stay, I just want to get you cleaned up. Is that okay?”

JJ nods, but it turns out there’s not much she can do. The bruises will heal with time, so she can only bandage the cut on his cheek and clean his split lip. 

JJ must see Kiara’s slight panic, how she’s struggling with the fact that she can’t really do anything to help him, and he places a warm hand on her arm. “It’s okay, Kie. I’m fine— really. You’ve done enough.”

She entirely disagrees with the statement that JJ is fine, but it’s well past two am, and she’s exhausted, so she leaves the first aid kit on the nightstand and climbs into bed beside him.

It’s quiet for a moment, the only sound the distant crashing of the waves and JJ’s breathing. He looks peaceful enough, but the moonlight coming through the window illuminates the handprints on his neck, and Kiara can’t keep herself from saying, “I’m sorry, J. You deserve better than this. I wish—“

She breaks off, because she doesn’t really know how to finish that sentence. She wishes... what? That JJ’s dad wasn’t an abusive asshole? That he hadn’t gone home? That she could somehow protect him from something he’d been dealing with for years, that she’d noticed there was a problem sooner?

“I’m just... I’m sorry it took me so long to notice.”

“It’s nothing that hasn’t happened before,” he says, as if that makes it okay, eyes still closed.

“This isn’t normal, JJ,” she hisses, though she thinks deep down he knows that. “I get that he’s your dad, okay? But why the hell would you go back there? Especially after he knows that you stole the Phantom.”

JJ sighs, rubs a hand over his face. “I just needed some new clothes, okay? There’s no laundry machine at the Chateau. They were starting to smell.”

“You could have asked—“

“I’m not putting this on you, Kie,” he says, and she hates how he phrases it, as if he was some burden. “Or Pope. Y’all have enough shit to deal with. I don’t deserve—“

Kiara wants to kill Luke Maybank in that moment. Not just for the bruises littering JJ’s skin, but for the mental and emotional scars left by years of abuse, how JJ doesn’t even seem to think he’s worthy of love. Most of all, she hates the dark, empty look in his eyes that even her attempts at comfort can’t fix. 

“Yes, you do,” she says, not needing JJ to finish his sentence to know what he was about to say. “You deserve this, JJ. You deserve _more_. And I should have said that to you before, I should have noticed—“

JJ turns his head towards her, and Kiara tries to focus on what he’s saying instead of how blue his eyes are as he tells her, “It’s not your fault, Kie, okay? Don’t worry about it.”

“But I _am_ worried about it,” she snaps, because even though she doesn’t want to argue with JJ right now, he needs to understand that just because John B’s gone doesn’t mean there’s no one who cares about him. “I’m worried about you, okay? With John B and Sarah being— I just can’t lose anyone else, not now, I—“

She realized she’s kind of hyperventilating, and JJ raises an arm to pull her into his side, tightening his grip when she tries to move away at his hiss of pain. He smells like laundry detergent and cocoa butter, and the warmth has finally reentered his bones, so it’s easy to curl up against him. He whispers words of comfort into her hair, promises about staying safe she knows he won’t keep, but as their hands wind together and her head falls into the crook his neck, her fingers in his hair and their legs intertwined, and she decides that it’s enough for right now.

“Maybe we can protect each other from now on,” she whispers a few minutes later, when she thinks JJ’s already gone to sleep.

“I’d like that,” he whispers back, squeezing her hand a little tighter. “Brave warrior princess and her knight in shining armor, and all that shit.”

“Whatever you want, JJ.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i don’t know why but i always end up writing one shots from kiara’s perspective?? i just noticed that this time and realized i should probably try switching it up more lol. as always, requests are open and kudos/comments are always appreciated!


	5. you’re the one that i want

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> it’s been a few months since her and jj started dating, and everything’s going great— until kiara’s parents find out that they’re together, and shit hits the fan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> @michellejardim: You could do kind of like a part 2 where we see their relationship: they are always making out and kissing at johnny b's place, kie’s parents find out that she’s dating jj 
> 
> thank you for the request!! sorry it’s so late, but i hope that you like it!
> 
> this can either be read as a part two to my first one shot, or as a stand alone. don’t forget to leave kudos/comments if you enjoy :)

It was no secret that Kiara’s parents didn’t approve of JJ.

Even when they were kids, the definition between Kooks and Pogues was well-known, and JJ Maybank was about as _Pogue_ as they come. 

Kiara had gotten used to the comments her parents would make. It was always the same: subtle suggestions to stay away from anyone with the name _Maybank_ , her mother purposefully locking her jewelry in the safe whenever Kiara invited JJ over. 

At first, she’d been too young to understand what they really meant, just that JJ was her friend and she wanted to spend time with him, no matter what her parents thought. 

But now Kiara was older, and wiser, and she knew that even if JJ liked to pretend otherwise, the way people tended to talk about him, about his family, hurt.

She’s seen it a thousand times— with her parents, with the store owners that stared at JJ with beady eyes and made him turn out his pockets, how Shoupe hadn’t hesitated to arrest him once JJ had reminded him where he was from, who his father was.

Kiara’s come to recognize JJ’s habit of reinforcing his reputation with cocky comments and reckless behavior as a defense mechanism. Because if people expect the worst of him, there’s no way for him to disappoint them. 

She hates it, because JJ is one of the best people she knows, and it shouldn’t matter who his father is or that he lives on the Cut.

And she would love to change the whole island’s view of him, but at the moment, she would settle for just her parents.

Because it’s been three months since JJ officially became her boyfriend, and they still have no idea.

•••

It was never Kiara’s intention to start sneaking around with JJ, but at this point, they’ve gotten so good at it that it’s difficult to justify stopping.

It’s not like their relationship is a secret, because all the Pogues know, and they’re not exactly opposed to PDA. 

Especially JJ— he’d always been physically affectionate, but it had become almost constant since they’d started dating. Not that Kiara was complaining. 

It was always something: a hand on her back to guide her into the van or out of the boat, his fingers in her hair while they were lying on the couch watching a movie, an arm around her shoulders after a long day of surfing. 

She loved it, really. How he’d pull her onto his lap when they were sitting around the bonfire with the Pogues, a hand on her leg and another on the neck of his beer bottle or whatever joint he was smoking. His attention started to shift real quick, once Kiara got tipsy enough to start pressing kisses to his neck, and the Pogues threw bottle caps at them until they disappeared inside the Chateau. 

The sex wasn’t bad either, not that she’d expected it to be. Girls talked, and even if Kiara didn’t subscribe to gossip the same way Sarah did, she’d heard enough about what JJ could do with his mouth and hands and well, everything else. Now, she had proof, and they definitely hadn’t exaggerated. 

The Pogues liked to tease them about it— the fact that they were constantly touching, the heated looks that passed between them before they escaped to JJ’s room at the Chateau, how they couldn’t seem to keep their hands to themselves. 

Kiara would have protested more, but to be honest, her and JJ knew it was true. 

And they’d spent so many years dancing around each other, that Kiara didn’t intend on wasting anymore time. 

•••

It’s one hundred percent her fault, what happens next. 

Well, maybe eighty percent her fault, and twenty percent JJ’s fault, because when he looks at her with hooded eyes and that god damn smirk as she steps out of the bathroom after her shower in nothing but a black bralette and underwear, she can’t resist the urge to rush across her bedroom and pull him into a heated kiss. 

It was kind of an unspoken rule that they didn’t do this kind of shit at Kiara’s house until after her parents were asleep, but they both had other things on their minds, and she may have forgotten to lock her door while JJ’s lips were on her neck. Sue her, okay? He was good at this.

So, when they’re lying in bed and JJ’s head is in between Kiara’s legs, it takes her a moment to register the sound of her mother’s scream and the door slamming shut.

Kiara shoves him off of her in an instant, and JJ swears as he hits the floor with a thud. She’s on her feet immediately, grabs a sweatshirt and tugs it over her head, hisses at JJ to shut up because he’s still groaning and clutching his hands to his head, claiming she gave him brain damage.

She eases open the door slowly, and comes face to face with her mother with flushed cheeks and her hands on her hips.

_Oh, this wasn’t good._

“JJ Maybank, Kiara? _Really?_ ”

“It’s not what—“

Kiara stops talking, because yes, it’s exactly what it looks like. Shit. She was in such deep, _deep_ shit. 

“I think I tolerate a lot, Kiara,” her mother says, clearly struggling to remain calm. “Especially after everything you put us through last year. But this—“

She gestured towards the closed bedroom door as if it contained a nuclear bomb, and Kiara realizes that’s what this is to her mother. A grenade that could blow up the reputation she’d spent years carefully cultivating. 

Because everyone knew that if you associated with a Maybank, you were as good as trash to the rich, spoiled Kooks who lived on Figure Eight. 

Kiara might have been able to accept that, to bite her tongue, but her mother wasn’t done. “I told you what I think about that boy, Kiara. He’s not good for you, he’s trouble. And I don’t want you with him, end of discussion.”

Once, she might have listened to that, but Kiara’s almost eighteen, and she’s so done with her parents treating her friends, treating _JJ_ , like the dirt beneath their shoes. 

“No.”

Her mother frowns, shakes her head, as if she can’t believe Kiara’s fighting her on this. “What do you mean, no?”

“I’m not leaving him,” she says, keeping her voice steady as she crosses her arms. “I know perfectly well what you think about JJ, Mom. Trust me, you’ve never hesitated to make your opinion known. But I don’t give a damn about your reputation, and I’m not losing him. So you can support us and have me in your life, or you can try and stop me and lose me, but I’m not changing my mind. End of discussion.”

Kiara throws her mother’s words back at her with a smirk, doesn’t wait for her response before she turns and opens the door, intending to tell JJ it was safe to come out now.

But her bedroom was empty, the curtains blowing in the breeze coming through the now-open window, and JJ was gone.

•••

Kiara wants to go find JJ immediately, because she knows that despite her constant reassurances he still thinks he’s not good enough for her, and that overhearing her mother saying exactly that had to be hard for him, but she’s prevented from doing so when her father arrives.

Her dad is typically a calm, level-headed person, so he doesn’t yell at first. 

Instead, his voice is low and stern when he addresses her, like a drill sergeant giving orders. It makes it worse, she thinks, because it’s harder to argue with him.

“You’re not seeing that boy again.”

“That’s not for you to decide,” she says, fighting to keep her voice steady at even the idea of that, of never seeing JJ again. “This is my life, not yours. I’m not—“

And Kiara knows she shouldn’t get angry, that she should just leave and give her parents some time to cool down, but she’s had enough of people acting like they know JJ when they don’t. 

Her parents had no way of knowing that he’s the one person who’s always been there for her, how he held her as she cried in the months after John B and Sarah’s disappearance, the nights spent huddled together in the pullout couch at the Chateau when neither of them could sleep due to nightmares or insomnia or both.

They didn’t know how quick he was to defend her, about the dozens of times he’d punched a Kook who’d gotten a little too handsy, the lengths he would go to if her or any of their friends were in trouble. 

They didn’t know how caring JJ was, how supportive and generous and sweet he could be when he thought no one was paying attention. Not just to her, but to everyone. 

It amazes her, really, that after everything JJ has been through, he’s still able to be kind to people, to believe her when she tells him that she loves him.

“I’m not leaving him,” Kiara finishes, ignoring the fact that she’s shaking, from anger or worry or stress, she’s not quite sure. “I _love_ him.” 

“Kiara,” her dad snaps, and she can tell that he’s losing patience. “You don’t understand , we’re just trying to protect you—“

“And who protects JJ, huh?” Kiara screams, her hands curling into fists, eyes suddenly burning with rage and unshed tears. “Who protects him? You have no idea what he’s been through, and you know what, neither do I, because he won’t even tell _me_ most of it. It’s not like you’ve ever cared to listen. And I’m sick of it, okay? I’m sick of you treating him like shit!”

She doesn’t mean to yell, doesn’t really know where the burst of anger comes from, only that this is an argument that’s been brewing for over a year now, ever since her parents had refused to post JJ’s bail and she’d escaped Midsummers with him, threw her arms around him in front of a crowd of Kooks. 

“Kiara, I don’t think you get—“

“You’re from the Cut, Dad!” Kiara shouts, unable to keep the pain from her voice at his blank, disappointed expression. “I thought you would at least try to understand, but all you and Mom care about is your reputation. It’s disgusting, and I’m not going to be a part of it anymore.”

Her father doesn’t answer at first, staring at Kiara like she’s a completely different person than the daughter he raised. 

“If that’s what you think, then you don’t belong under this roof. Find somewhere else to stay tonight.”

Kiara’s mother murmurs a quiet protest, places a hand on her father’s arm, but he shoves her away and storms upstairs, slamming his bedroom door behind him. 

The harsh sound snaps Kiara out of the trance she’s fallen into, and her chest is still heaving, her hands shaking as she turns and walks out the door, ignoring her mother’s feeble attempts to make her stay.

Kiara doesn’t need her parents in her life, not if they’re going to act like this.

She knows exactly where her real home is, and she’s going to find him. 

•••

By the time Kiara arrives at the Chateau, the adrenaline from her fight with her parents has faded, and she can feel exhaustion tugging at her bones.

She finds JJ inside, lounging on the couch in a pair of sweatpants she’s pretty sure are Pope’s, eyes glassy from the empty beer bottle sitting on the table and the joint in his hand. 

Kiara doesn’t bother talking at first, the speech she’d prepared about how everything her mother said about JJ was false suddenly vanishing from her head.

JJ, like always, can tell when something’s wrong, must see the tears still drying on her cheeks and the exhaustion lacing her every moment, because he opens his arms and lets her fall beside him on the couch.

The tv is showing reruns of some old cartoon, the kind Kiara used to watch on Sunday mornings with her parents, and she stares blankly at the screen, her back pressed against JJ’s bare chest. 

“You okay?” He asks, hesitantly wrapping his arms around her waist, as if he thinks she might move away from him. 

Kiara nods, ignores the tears burning at the corner of her eyes. “Yeah. But... can I stay here? For the night?”

She doesn’t mention that it’s because her parents technically kicked her out, because she knows exactly how JJ would respond to _that_.

“Yeah, of course,” he murmurs, but she can sense the frown that’s probably on his face even without looking at him. “You sure everything’s okay?”

Kiara nods, already tired of talking, curls further into JJ’s side, buries her face in the space between his neck and shoulder. 

JJ rubs lazy, soothing circles into the fabric of her sweatshirt, plays with a loose curl that’s escaped her messy bun. Kiara finds the casual touches calming, proof that he hasn’t entirely shut her out. He smells like weed and beer, but beneath that there’s the traces of salt and sunscreen that are distinctly JJ. 

They lie there in silence for a while, long enough that Kiara closes her eyes and starts to fade into sleep, until the sound of JJ’s voice wakes her.

“Kie, maybe this... maybe this is a bad idea.”

It takes her a second to understand what he means, but when she does, Kiara turns around to face him, propping herself up on her elbows. “What?”

JJ hesitates, bites his lip and avoids her gaze, like he always does when he’s about to say something he knows she won’t like. “It’s just... your parents have a point, you know. I’m not exactly the poster-child for respectable and good behavior. That’s Pope—“

Kiara grabs JJ’s chin and turns it towards her, simultaneously shutting him up and making him look at her. “Are we seriously going to have the _I’m choosing you_ conversation all over again? Really?”

JJ huffs, pulling his face from her grip and taking a sip of his beer. “I’m just saying, I don’t blame them for not wanting you to be with me. So maybe we should, you know, cool it for a bit. Just until—“

“Wait, I’m sorry, what?” She snaps, crossing her arms, choosing to be angry instead of giving into the pit of dread in her stomach. “Are you seriously trying to _break up with me_ right now?”

“No, Kie, God no,” JJ stammers, looking officially uncomfortable. “That’s not what I’m saying. I just think—“

Kiara doesn’t let him finish, winding a hand through the hair at the back of his head and tugging him toward her, smirking at JJ’s sharp intake of breath as she presses her lips to his. She smiles when he groans, tugs her closer until she’s straddling him on the couch.

She pulls back after a minute, grinning at his swollen lips and slightly dazed expression. She’s always liked that, the effect she has on JJ, even after all these months. 

“What was that for?” He asks, licking his lips, his eyes flicking towards Kiara’s heaving chest, the slope of her neck.

“To shut you up,” she says, running her fingers through his curls, smirking when he practically purrs and pushes against her hand, demanding more. She likes JJ like this— drunk and a little bit high, pliant beneath her. It’s much better than the JJ of a few moments ago, the one who wouldn’t stop talking. “You still wanna _cool it_ for a little bit? Honestly, J, what kind of bullshit is that?”

“I just...” he falters when brushes the skin of his neck with her thumb, the exact place where she’d left a hickey earlier that day. “I just don’t want you to feel like you’re... stuck with me, or something. Maybe you’d be better off with a Kook, you know, someone who wouldn’t get you into trouble. Who could give you more than... this.”

Kiara pauses her ministrations, leans away so that she can get a good look at JJ’s face, the glazed eyes and flushed cheeks and scarred skin. “What if _this_ is what I want?”

“Kie, please, don’t—“

“I’m being serious,” she snaps, though her hands don’t leave his neck, and she inches slightly closer to him. She wants JJ to know that she’s still here, that she’s not going anywhere. “I’m not stuck with you, JJ. I _want_ to be with you. I _love_ you. Why is that so hard to believe? What more do you want me to say?”

Kiara knows it all comes down to his dad, the fact that JJ’s mom left and never came back, but honestly she doesn’t have the patience for all of that tonight. She’s already done with this conversation, hadn’t wanted to have it in the first place.

JJ’s still not talking, just staring at her with this unreadable expression on his face. She lets him digest her words, decide what he wants to say. 

“I’m sorry, but... I just don’t get it,” he admits after a moment, reaching up to take her hand from his neck and starts playing with her fingers. “I mean why would you choose me, out of everyone. What makes me so special?”

Kiara sighs, the ache in her chest growing, because she honestly doesn’t know how she’ll ever prove to JJ that he’s the only one she wants, that her being with him is a choice and not an obligation.

But maybe he just needs to hear this from her, even though she’s said it before. And if that’s what it takes, she more than fine with it. The reasons why she loves JJ are endless, and she’s started to make a list for moments exactly like this.

“Because you’re my best friend,” she tells him, smiling when JJ’s head shoots up, as if he didn’t expect her to actually answer. “Because you’re the only person who’s always stood by me, even when I didn’t deserve it. Because you’re kind, and funny, and smart. You’re one of the best people I know, J. And it’s okay if you don’t believe that right now, because I do. I’ll just... believe for the both of us.”

She doesn’t comment on the sudden moisture in JJ’s eyes, the tears she can feel seeping into the fabric of her sweatshirt as he burrows his head in her shoulder and presses a kiss to the side of her neck. 

“I love you,” he mumbles against her skin, and Kiara melts, sinks into him.

JJ doesn’t say it often, but when he does, it’s enough to leave Kiara smiling for days, because she knows how hard it is for him to say those words to her, to let her have that piece of himself.

“I love you too, babe,” she whispers, tugging him back onto the couch beside her, running her fingers over his skin, towards the band of the sweatpants lying low on his hips. “You want to finish what we started? We got interrupted earlier.”

JJ nods, the emotion in his eyes replaced by simmering heat as he smirks at her and leans down, pressing the ghost of a kiss against the skin of her neck. 

“Oh, I’d love to.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> might write a part two/three to this about how jj earns kie’s parents approval. let me know if that sounds interesting to you!


	6. you know i’ll always be right there

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> when jj gets sick he tries to hide it, but kie sees right through him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lily on ao3: Could you please do some severe JJ whump or sick JJ with concerned Kie and concerned pogues?   
> Harper on ao3: This was so good :) can u do one where maybe jj sick n she looks after him
> 
> this is 100% fluff but JJ DESERVES HAPPINESS, okay? also i’m sorry there’s not that much of the other pogues in this, i got caught up in soft jj and kie, but i hope you like it anyway :)
> 
> also, if anyone reading this is interested, i’m hosting a jiara fic week in july with some other obx blogs on tumblr, and would love it if anyone who writes for them wants to join! it’s super open-ended and lowkey, so there’s no pressure, but all the information is linked here on my tumblr. please let me know if you’re interested!

If Kiara was here, she would say _I told you so._

JJ normally would have argued with her, but if he was being honest, she _had_ told him so three days ago, when he and John B had surfed the surge in the middle of a hurricane.

 _You’re going to get sick,_ she’d snapped when she saw them, soaked to the bone but grinning from ear to ear. _It would serve you right, too. Idiots._

John B had let Kie wrap him in a fluffy towel, dry his hair and force him into a pair of sweatpants. But JJ had declined her help on principle, spent the rest of the evening in his swim trunks and a t-shirt, even when he started shivering.

 _When you’re hacking up a lung, don’t come crying to me,_ she’d said, shaking her head. 

_Relax, Mama,_ he’d told her, taking a long draw from the joint propped between his fingers, the high definitely helping with the cold ache in his bones. I’ll be fine. Maybanks have been surfing the surge for decades, it’s in my blood. 

_Oh, there’s something in your blood, alright,_ she’d hissed, plucking the joint from his hand. _It’s called essence of dumbassery._

And now, JJ was paying the price for that dumbassery.

He’d had a sore throat yesterday, but he’d brushed it off, ignored the urge to ask Kie for one of the boujee, honey-flavored cough drops she always kept in her car. Because _she’d told him so,_ and he wasn’t about to prove her right.

But when JJ had woken up this morning, intent on joining the rest of the Pogues for a day of surfing at Rixon’s Cove, his throat was aching and his head felt like someone had stuffed it with cotton.

Fortunately, there’d been a party at the Boneyard the night before, so when John B had banged on the door and told him it was time to go, he’d mumbled that he had a hangover and was staying in.

Pope or Kie probably wouldn’t have bought it, because JJ’s tolerance was infamously high, but John B was easier to fool. 

So, he’d listened for the sound of the van’s engine starting that meant the Pogues had left, and then he’d dragged himself out of bed and stumbled into the kitchen, for once regretting that the only thing they kept in the fridge was alcohol. He tried to make himself some tea, but it was too watery and cold and nothing like Kie’s— she was kind of a fanatic when it came to that sort of stuff, always trying fancy, new blends and shit. JJ had teased her for it, but right now he was regretting that decision.

He collapsed into bed after that, buried his face in the pillows to try and ease the pounding in his head. JJ rarely got sick, and now he was remembering why: it _sucked_. 

He jerks awake a few hours later, vision blurry and muscles aching, when the front door of the Chateau slams against its hinges and he hears Kie screaming for him. “JJ, I’m back! You still breathing? Didn’t choke on your own vomit, did you?”

JJ considers just staying quiet, hopes Kiara will go away before she opens the bedroom door and sees his present state, but she keeps shouting his name and banging around in the kitchen, and all the noise is making his headache unbearable.

“In here, Kie,” he says eventually, barely able to raise his voice above a whisper without his throat screaming at him. 

Either Kiara somehow manages to hear him, or she‘s just checking every room in the house, because the door creaks open a few moments later and she appears, hair wet and cheeks flushed from surfing, a damp t-shirt that could be his or John B’s thrown over her swimsuit. 

“Are you seriously still in bed, Maybank? It’s one in the afternoon. And you call me a princess—”

JJ opens his mouth to respond, but then he starts coughing, and Kiara’s smile fades when she sees him bent over and hacking, struggling to breathe.

“Shit, JJ, are you okay?” She asks, kneeling at the foot of the bed, a hand on his shoulder. 

JJ tries to nod, but he recognizes that his _I’m fine_ act is slightly weakened by the fact that his eyes are watering and he still can’t breathe right.

Kiara presses a hand to his forehead, and then she frowns. “Fuck, JJ, you’re burning up. Are you—”

“I’m not sick,” he rasps, even as he has to resist the urge to press his head further into her hand, because Kiara’s skin feels wonderfully cold for some reason. “Seriously, Kie, I’m all good. You don’t have ‘ta worry.” 

Kiara scoffs, but the look in her eyes is almost fond as she says, “Uh huh, sure JJ. Did you take any medicine? Have something to eat?”

“Tried to make tea,” he mumbles, distantly recognizing that he’s slurring his words. “Wasn’t as good as yours, though—”

“Okay, alright, let’s just lie you down, okay?” Kiara murmurs, guiding JJ back against the pillows, tugging the sheets over his chest. 

“I’m hot,” he whines, pulling at his sweat-soaked t-shirt. He gets it off eventually, with Kie’s help. “You’re cold, come here.”

He tries to tug Kiara onto the bed, but she remains standing, shaking her head at him. Part of JJ knows he’s acting kind of strange, because that’s not something he would normally ever say to Kie, but it doesn’t seem all that important in the moment. He feels like he’s drunk or high or maybe both— everything’s kind of blurry around the edges, and he really wants human contact for some reason. “‘Cmon, Kie, I’m sick, show a guy some sympathy—”

“Oh, so _now_ you admit it,” she says, rolling her eyes, pressing JJ back into the mattress with a firm hand. “Typical. I’ll be right back, okay? Don’t move.”

Then she’s gone, and JJ suddenly remembers his sore throat and pounding head. He wants Kiara to come back, with her cold hands and soft voice that kind of reminds him of his mother.

But his mother never took care of him when he was sick— JJ remembers that, even now. How he would wake up with a stuffy nose and aching muscles, stumble out into the living room to find Luke glaring at him and saying, _What the hell are you looking at, boy?_

He’s not used to this, so when Kiara returns with her arms filled with water and bottles of medicine, he doesn’t really understand what she’s doing.

He must ask her out loud, because Kiara rolls her eyes again and says, “I’m taking care of you, you dumbass. Now, here, drink this.”

She props JJ up against the headboard, hands him some Advil and a bottle of water, doesn’t look away until he’s swallowed it. He thinks it must be that placebo shit that Pope talks about when he’s telling them about medical trials he’s read about, but he feels better almost immediately.

Kie must notice his relieved expression, because she shakes her head and says, “You’re probably dehydrated, idiot. Drink the rest of that.”

“Bossy,” JJ mumbles under his breath, but he does finish the water, and he has to admit that it helps.

Kiara coaxes a thermometer into his mouth at some point, makes a _tsk_ sound when she pulls it out and sees his temperature.

“That bad, huh?” JJ asks, even though he doesn’t really care, not when Kiara’s sitting next to him and acting all concerned. He shouldn’t like it, shouldn’t like how her brow is furrowed and she’s fussing, but he can’t help it.

“You’ll be fine,” Kie answers, even though she still sounds kind of worried. “You just need some more sleep, and some fucking water. Seriously, JJ, what have I always told you?”

“Hydrate or die,” he murmurs, because somehow that phrase makes it through his fever-thick brain. “Relax, Kie, I’m—”

“I swear to God, JJ, if you say you’re fine one more time, I’ll stick this thermometer where the sun don’t shine.”

He thinks she’s joking, but Kiara is also kind of scary when she’s in Mama Pogue mode and he can’t be sure, so JJ keeps his mouth shut. 

He’s suddenly exhausted, too, sinks back into the pillows and closes his eyes. After a few minutes of silence, he hears the floorboards creak, forces his eyes open to see Kie standing in the doorway, wincing as she turns the handle, as if she didn’t want to wake him.

“Where are you going?” JJ asks, and she freezes in place, turns her head towards him and frowns slightly.

“I’m just gonna crash on the pullout, let you get some sleep—”

“No, stay,” he says before he can think of all the reasons it’s a bad idea, but he must look more pathetic than usual, because Kiara’s gaze softens and she takes a step towards the bed, hesitates. 

“Please,” JJ whispers, not caring how desperate he sounds, because Kiara’s hands are cold and his blurry vision makes her look even prettier than usual and he really just doesn’t want to be alone right now. “I’ll keep my hands to myself, I promise. Won’t even cop a feel. Just... stay.”

Kiara sighs, but then she climbs into bed beside him. JJ relaxes instantly, even though he’s kind of shivering, the heat in his bones turning to cold. Kiara seems warm now, so he inches closer until their shoulders are touching. 

“JJ?” Kiara murmurs, her hand on his arm again. “You okay?”

“Yeah, just cold,” he tells her, not expecting her to move closer and wrap an arm around his shoulders, resting her head on top of his.

“Better?” She asks, her fingers rubbing warmth into skin, and JJ doesn’t know why, but it’s kind of the best thing ever. 

“Yeah, thanks Kie,” JJ says, eyes fluttering closed as Kiara brushes his damp hair from his forehead. Her hair brushes his nose, and he sniffs, breathing in the familiar scent of her shampoo— a mix of chocolate and coconut. “You smell good.”

“Yeah, well you smell like shit, so.”

“Sorry,” he whispers, shrugging, only because he know Kiara doesn’t really care. Her best friends are three teenage boys with only two working showers between them, so she’s used to it.

“It’s okay.”

After a few minutes of quiet where JJ entertains himself by listening to Kiara’s breathing, which is much steadier and smoother than his, he asks, “Is this the part where you tell me you told me so?”

Kiara laughs under her breath, but her fingers are still playing with his hair, and JJ doesn’t stop himself from nudging her hand, silently begging for more. “Oh, I’m going to give you so much shit for this, Maybank. Just you wait.”

“M’kay,” he mumbles, burying his head in the soft material of her t-shirt. “Thanks, Kie.”

“You said that already.”

Kiara sounds amused, but there’s a certain tenderness to her voice when she ghosts her fingers over the skin of his shoulder and says, “You’re welcome, JJ. Go to sleep now, okay?”

JJ nods faintly, let’s out a long breath of air, the ache in his throat finally starting to fade. He can feel exhaustion tugging at him, soothed by Kie’s steady breathing and automatic warmth, and she might press a kiss to his forehead before he falls asleep, but he can’t be sure.

Later, when John B and Pope return to the Chateau, they find Kiara and JJ sleeping in the same bed, legs intertwined and Kiara’s fingers in JJ’s hair. They don’t say anything, but John B sighs and shakes his head and Pope stands in the doorway for a little longer than he should, because neither of them had believed Kie when she said she wanted to head home early to check on her parents.

Because she might deny it, and JJ and her would surely be at each other’s throats again as soon as he was feeling better, but when it came down to it Kiara would always be there when he needed her.


End file.
